


tree branches

by sapphireLavender



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/F, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, eventually
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-11-03 18:17:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 29
Words: 30,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17882810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphireLavender/pseuds/sapphireLavender
Summary: Sometimes, it's difficult to make your friends get along. Callum and Ezran certainly have enough difficulty.





	1. difficulties

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write some raydia and, at the same time, ignore my current raydia fanfic.
> 
> Takes place in season 2. AU where they stay for a few days.

Fools. They had to be up to something. She knew it, but she was the only one who didn't trust them, apparently. She was the only one with a reason to.

'Well, now that we know it was only Soren and Claudia, there's no reason for us to leave just yet, right? Zym still needs to learn how to fly. Just a few more days.' She remembered them saying. Ugh, humans.

Rayla watched from a tree, keeping a close eye on them. They had to be up to something...

"We can't trust them." Rayla said, once again. It seemed like all she was saying lately.

"We couldn't trust you at first, either." Callum commented. Ezran was running around, holding Zym. Yet another attempt to teach the baby dragon how to fly.

"This is different. I know they're up to something."

"Maybe." Callum replied, "Or maybe, you don't know them like we do."

It was frustrating. She couldn't just tell them she didn't trust them because she knew they were lying. That's not how she was going to tell them.

"Why don't you try to talk to them? They're actually pretty nice, you know." Callum suggested, "I mean, when they're not attacking you. Which is also what I would say about you! See, you already have something in common."

"Oh, good. I'm sure me and those elf-hating humans will just be best friends! Maybe we'll sing a few songs. Exchange secrets. Have a sleep over!"

"Maybe, you never know." Callum said, "I mean, Ezran and I didn't expect we'd be friends with an assassin, but we are. So maybe you can be friends with Soren and Claudia. Like me and Ezran are."

Rayla sighed.

* * *

Callum and Ezran were, unfortunately, pretty fond of the idea of Rayla being friends with Soren and Claudia.

In fact, they decided they would all become friends faster if they were in the same room together. Talking to each other.

"So how did you guys meet?" Soren asked, sitting near Claudia, who didn't seemed to mind being forced to become friends with someone they didn't want to. Rayla did not feel the same.

"Well, she uh, broke into the castle... Trying to kill Ezran." Callum said, "But then we showed her the egg and then uh, Claudia showed up."

"I remember that part." Claudia added, and then casually, "That's when I tried to shoot her with lightning, but you chained my hand."

"Yeah, sorry about that."

"And then we went to roof to try and stop the mission, and then she held off that other elf for us. And then we left the castle to return Zym."

"So, yeah, friendship." Callum finished.

"So you guys were pretty much instantly friends with an elf who tried to kill you?" Soren questioned.

"Pretty much."

"Was there like, any particular moment when you became friends?" Claudia asked.

"Maybe the ice situation?" Callum thought. Ah, the ice situation. When he started trusting her.

"I thought it was when we were on the roof." Ezran commented, "Maybe when we ran away from the castle? Or the boat ride."

"Ugh, the boat ride."

A memory Rayla wasn't particularly fond of. There were some parts that weren't so bad, though. Like when she landed on the grass, and not the water. Or when they pushed the boat away, into the distance.

* * *

Needless to say, the first time Callum and Ezran made them sit in the same room and talk, they didn't really become friends like they hoped they would.

But they didn't stop trying.

* * *

Soren was working out. Probably to try and intimidate her.

"So," He started a conversation, "You're an elf."

"Yep." Rayla replied, not particularly amused.

"A moonshadow elf." He continued, stretching, "So, do you really drink-"

"No."

"Oh, good." Soren said, "That makes way more sense. Can't imagine there's a lot of nutrients in it."

* * *

Claudia was a bit different. Perhaps a bit more polite, because she didn't ask the questions Soren had. Or perhaps, less. It was hard to tell. She didn't make any effort to talk.

Rayla stared at her, and she did the same.

"See? That wasn't so bad, was it?" Callum asked.

"I don't think you want the answer to that."

"So," Claudia started, similar to how her brother had, and almost hesitantly asked, "What do you like to do?"

Rayla stared at her, much like she had earlier, "Handstands."

Strangely enough, that was the only thing she could think of at the moment. What was she supposed to say she liked? Being an assassin?

"Really?" Claudia said, "My brother Soren does those sometimes. I used to try and do them with him but I guess it just wasn't my thing."

"Huh."

"Can you do one now?"

"Why?" Rayla inquired. What reason would she have for wanting Rayla to do a handstand?

"I don't know. Why not? I mean, if you can do a handstand."

So she did. Not for very long, though, in case Claudia decided to attack or something.

Claudia smiled, "You must be pretty strong, since you were doing so good in your battle with Soren."

She just blinked at her.

"You know, it was actually pretty funny when you kicked mud in his face."

"Really?" Rayla questioned.

"Yeah, I mean it wasn't that hot and he didn't actually get hurt." Claudia said, adjusting her position.

"What are you up to?"

"What do you mean?" Claudia looked confused, like she wasn't sure what Rayla was referring to.

"You know what I mean. I know you're up to something, you're lying to them."

"We're not up to anything." Claudia argued, "I know you might not trust us, but we'd never hurt Callum or Ezran. And if they decide they want to come home, that's their decision."

"So you're lying to them to get them to come home?"

"No."

* * *

And then Claudia told him.


	2. arguments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> rayla and claudia talk.

Rayla was walking around, which almost seemed pointless at the moment. If they were right, the only ones after them were Soren and Claudia, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to keep an eye out.

She hadn't talked to either of them since the other night. She didn't feel up to fighting with them, too, and she knew that's all that would happen.

But, inevitably, she ran into one of them. Specifically, Claudia.

She was sitting in the grass, underneath a tree, while Rayla was walking past. There didn't seem to be any point to it, not even a book and she didn't appear to be observing the nature, more or less just staring off into the distance.

Perhaps she was thinking, lost in her thoughts or something.

"Ugh." Rayla stared at the human. Her expression was difficult to make out, her hair was as it usually was again.

"Hey." She said. Her voice was quieter than it usually was, which might have been what made it sound less enthuastic, "Do you want to sit?"

She gestured to a spot next to her on the grass. Rayla walked over, only to pull our her swords and climb the tree, sitting on a branch. Claudia covered her mouth, as though she was attempting not to laugh.

"I'm not gonna attack you, you know."

"Maybe not," Rayla replied, "How do I know you're not lying?"

"Well, I don't think attacking Callum's other friends is gonna make him feel better." She explained.

"Probably not."

Rayla looked down at Claudia, and Claudia looked at her. It seemed like at least a minute passed before Claudia smiled, "So, are you going to come down here and sit? It's nice down here."

She jumped down from the tree, sitting underneath it in silence and keeping an eye on Claudia. They had to be up to something, after all, and she wasn't about to fall into whatever they had planned.

Despite how focused she had been on Claudia, she was still surprised by what she said.

"How come it's taking us so long?"

"What?"

"Callum and Ezran said they became friends with you pretty much instantly," Claudia continued, "And Ez keeps saying we'd be friends if we just got to know each other, but I don't think we've gotten any closer than when we first met."

"This is different. I trust them."

"So do you only become friends with people you've tried to kill?" Claudia asked, though it didn't appear to be a serious question.

"No."

"Then how come?"

"You called an egg a dangerous weapon, for one." Rayla argued, "And I know you're up to something."

"Isn't it?" Claudia replied, "And in my defense, I didn't know he'd be so cute."

"No! What made you even think that?"

"That's what my dad said. He took it to protect us," Claudia explained, "That Zym would be the most powerful creature in the entire world and that the elves and dragons would use him against us."

"How does that make any of it okay?" Rayla questioned, "He still stole it, assuming that we'd use him!"

"Well, how does attacking us make it okay? Weren't you on an assassin team?"

"The humans attacked us unprovoked, we just wanted justice!" She continued arguing, "And I tried to convince the others to call it off when we found out about the egg, anyway. Zym is our only chance for peace."

Claudia smiled, which was slightly confusing, "I see."

"What?"

"I think we're starting to get somewhere."

* * *

They argued for quite awhile, maybe even a few hours. There was a few things they argued about, and some of the topics weren't even that serious. Sometimes, it didn't even seem like they were arguing, like maybe at some point they just started talking and they didn't even realize it...

But eventually, the conversation topic changed to magic.

* * *

"I don't get why Callum won't just let me teach him magic."

"Maybe because you don't know any." Rayla responded, although she knew that wasn't entirely true. Claudia did know a little.

"I know plenty. Just because it's not primal magic-"

"And that isn't magic. It's just horrible."

Claudia sighed, "We weren't born with a primal source. Unless he gets another primal stone, he's not going to be able to do anything. So I don't see why he doesn't at least try it out. There's nothing wrong with it."

"There's a lot wrong with it!"

"Like what?"

"Like what? Are you serious?" Rayla questioned, and suddenly she didn't know why she had been even starting to like the human, "Everything! You're using innocent creatures to make breakfast!"

"So? Who are you to judge, assassin?"

"That's different, and I'm barely even an assassin!"

"Well, my magic is different than you think it is." Claudia argued.

"Not really. I think I know pretty much everything I need to." Rayla stood up, prepared to walk away. This wasn't really a conversation she wanted to be having, honestly, she had been trying to avoid it.

"A lot of it's mostly just things like spiders, you know."

"Why would that make it any different? They're still living creatures. They have families." Rayla said, "They're not that much different from you, and they're not that much different from me."

"Maybe," Claudia sighed, like she was already tired of the argument, despite how short it was so far, "You know, we're never gonna agree on this. So maybe let's just, not talk about it. I mean, friends don't have to agree on everything."

"Friends?" Rayla asked.

"Might as well be, right?" Claudia smiled, "I mean, since Callum and Ezran like you so much. And ideally, Soren and I will be going with you guys, so it's not like we can avoid each other."

"We could." Rayla smiled at her, "But I suppose it wouldn't hurt to try and get along."

Neither of them said anything else for a few minutes, mostly just looking at each other, and maybe this could work out...

"So your brother. He's uh..."

"Yeah."


	3. betrayal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> soren and claudia make a plan.

"Soren, maybe it's time we gave up trying to get them to come home with us," Claudia suggested, "I mean, they seem to have made up their minds."

Soren fell off his chair - mostly due to what he was doing with it but a little to do with the surprise - and turned towards Claudia.

"What? But the mission."

"I know, but maybe we should just go with them. You know, say it took a little longer than we expected it to."

Soren picking the chair up, and raised an eyebrow, "Go with them to what? Return the dragon? Didn't you say that the dragon could be dangerous someday?"

"It could." Claudia said, "Or maybe it'll be a nice dragon. Who knows?"

She knew that most likely, it wouldn't be. At least to humans.

"Why don't we just go back to my plan? Muscles!" Soren inquired.

"Because, Soren, they're our friends and if we have a chance for peace, shouldn't we take it?" Claudia took a sip of her drink, "Ezran's probably just gonna return the dragon anyway."

The more she thought about it, the more likely it seemed they'd just end up returning the dragon anyway, especially since it was going to be up to Ezran, who was already going to return it. In a way, it really just seemed like it'd make the process longer to make them go back.

"I still don't see any reason not to use muscle."

Soren looked to her, as though asking her to give him a good reason why using muscle was a bad idea, and honestly, she had so many reasons it was hard to choose from one of them.

"How about the elf? She was doing pretty good when she was fighting both of us."

"So? There's still more of us."

"And she's still Callum and Ezran's friend."

Soren looked at her and sighed.

"Oh great, so she bit you too?"

"No. I'm just saying, it's not like it's not going to happen eventually and it's not really up to us. We could just go with them. Imagine how cool it would be to see all that magic."

She had heard the stories, about how there was basically magic everywhere. Claudia often thought about that, about all of the magic creatures there were there. It was fascinating.

There were so many things there she hadn't even seen, things she might have never even heard of.

"I imagine that there would be a lot of elves. Who hate us." Soren replied, staring at Claudia pointlessly. It frustrated her a little, there was so much more than just elves.

"I'm talking about things you never get the chance to see, Soren," Claudia argued, "You can see an elf who hates you anytime you want. You could go outside right now and look for her."

"Exactly. I don't really want to see anymore that hate us. How are we going to fight them all? There's no way we'd all be able to sneak in. It's too dangerous. We just need a plan to get Callum and Ezran home."

"Well, all of your plans involve muscle, so."

* * *

Claudia sighed, a little bit frustrated. She watched Ezran run around pointlessly attempting to teach the baby dragon how to fly. The wolf girl encouraged this, and similarly, the wolf seemed to.

She didn't really particularly like the plan, but Soren kept talking about the mission and insisting they do it. It didn't seem like the best idea, and maybe it'd get them home, but it'd be betraying their trust...

Her thoughts were interrupted when the elf sat down near her, watching Ezran continue attempting to teach the young dragon.

She looked at Rayla, and smiled. Rayla smiled back, and she liked the plan less and less.

* * *

But she went through with it anyway.

When they all started getting ready to leave, which took a little bit, Rayla was leaning against a tree. She didn't seem upset that she and Soren were coming with them, like maybe she didn't mind it that much or maybe she was just polite. She didn't seem like she had an opinion on it, really, or maybe she just didn't feel like arguing about it.

That would make sense, Claudia thought, seeing as she and Soren had talked about it with Callum and Ezran awhile ago, and she had even mentioned it to Rayla previously.

Mostly, she looked bored, like it was a weird thing for the humans to be taking so long.

Eventually, they were all ready, and they began walking. Which was their only form of transportation, currently, which was unfortunate.

Claudia walked next to Soren, behind Callum, Ezran and Rayla. It seemed fitting...

Just as she and Soren had discussed, as she had finally agreed to use muscle even though it didn't really seem like a good idea, they began the plan by pretending to go with them, though she was kinda thinking that maybe, they should just go with them.

It seemed like a better option than betraying them, even if it was dangerous. But here they were, lying to them.

As soon as they got the chance, they started the plan.

She couldn't say they got very far into it, which was almost a relief in a way, as when they attempted to do it Soren's way and use muscle, they were quickly interrupted by Corvus, and before they even had time to do anything else, the moon phoenix came along and she just wasn't fast enough with her magic, it seemed all she really managed to do was get a glance at their expressions.

Claudia hadn't seen Callum and Ezran look that betrayed before - because they trusted her and Soren because they were friends and they kept trying to convince Rayla that they were on their side - and Rayla's expression was far from a smile.

She watched them fly away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there isn't a lot of raydia lately for some reason, which is unfortunate.
> 
> I could be writing my other fanfic. But I am probably not going to do that and just keep starting new ones. also wouldn't it be kind of funny if I ended it here? I might do that.


	4. a lot of dragons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soren and Claudia run into Callum, Ezran and Rayla again.

"I was right." Rayla said as she climbed up, though she wasn't pleased, "They lied to us."

Callum was disappointed as well, since their friends betrayed them. He watched as they flew further and further away, while Ezran assured Zym it was safe to come out.

* * *

It was a shame Soren and Claudia never got to meet human Rayla, Ezran thought. He was a huge fan of human Rayla, and they'd probably like human Rayla too.

Though, human Rayla didn't end up being necessary. But Ezran still liked it, she was really accurate.

* * *

They didn't see Callum, Ezran or Rayla for awhile.

In fact, the next time they see them is actually a really bad time to see them, when fighting a full grown dragon. Or more specifically, after fighting a full grown dragon. That Soren picked a fight with when they were trying to drop off Corvus. And even more specifically, it was just the elf.

Which was definitely concerning. Where were the princes? Were they okay, or did the elf do something to them?

Though, they did trust the elf a lot. Maybe she didn't betray them like they did. Or maybe Soren was right, although that one seemed unlikely.

Rayla was not pleased to see them, and they weren't particularly pleased to see her, either, as she was attempting to free the dragon, for some reason.

Claudia already knew the elf was strong, but she only kept proving it. She was fast, and also showed that she was capable of holding off them and removing the chains from a dragon, a skill she was unaware the elf had.

She freed the dragon, and looked at them with anger.

Rayla would know where the princes were, which was unfortunately information they need, but she was really fast and they weren't really able to get her, even if they got close. It didn't matter, though, they both came to them anyway.

Ezran followed a baby dragon, and Callum made a decision and tried to learn something on his own, something that could be dangerous.

Callum ignored her, and distracted them while the dragon - which turned out to be okay - was, apparently, not alright with people attacking it. Or succeeding. It went for Soren, and he went flying or something, it was hard to see with so much to focus on, and he asked for help and it was time to make her own decision.

_If you have to choose, choose the egg._

"Soren!"

* * *

She runs into Ezran again, afterwards. He's okay, for the most part, and Soren will be too. If she can just find what she needs.

Ezran is helpful, even if he doesn't really know what she's going to do.

* * *

They were going to go home without the princes. They had something else, after all, maybe that'd be good enough. They ran into Corvus on their way, and he was with Ezran. Taking him home.

But for some reason, neither Callum or Rayla were with him.

"Wait, why isn't Callum with you if you're going home?" Claudia asked.

"He has to take Zym home." He answered.

"Alone?"

"He's not alone. Rayla's with him."

"But she's an elf." Soren pointed out, "He can't trust her."

"He can trust her." Ezran argued, "Rayla's our friend and we trust her. She'd never betray us."

Claudia looked down, thinking about that one time that she and Soren betrayed them for nothing, "Still, it's a tough journey. Maybe someone else should go with them, in case they get into trouble."

"You could." Soren suggested, "I mean, you were the one talking about how maybe we should actually go with them and all the things we could see and whatever."

"I don't think that's a good idea, we betrayed him."

"And you wouldn't be able to use your magic there." Ezran added in, "But maybe it'd be a good idea. Maybe he could teach you how to do primal magic."

Claudia just looked at him confused, "You mean with a primal stone?"

"Nope! Callum can do it without one, and maybe you could too." Ezran explained, "I'm not sure how Rayla would feel about you being there, after last time. Maybe you guys can still be friends."

"I doubt it..." Claudia said, quietly, and then continued, "But, I mean, I shouldn't just leave Soren here all alone. I mean, would you even be okay without me? I'm pretty great."

"I think so." Soren replied, "I'll have a lot of time to work on my poetry, in the meantime."

"Poetry?" Ezran questioned.

"Yeah, would you like to hear some?"

"I'm sure that won't be necessary." Claudia interrupted in an attempt to get back on topic,"I mean, you'll have plenty of time on the way back."

"That's true. If you want, I think I could get you a ride so you could catch up with them." Ezran smiled, and Claudia remembered when she ran into him, riding on an incredibly dangerous creature.

"That would be cool. But is it necessary for someone else to be there? I mean dad's expecting the both of us to return and all. But, I guess he's also expecting us to return with Callum and Ezran."

"Yeah. So Soren will return with me, and you'll go after Callum. But without the bringing him back part." Ezran suggested.

"I guess that could work." Claudia smiled.

"Also, I don't trust the elf isn't going to betray him or something. He shouldn't go in there alone." Soren added, "Just uh, be careful. And whatever."

"Yeah."

* * *

Claudia left later during the day, unfortunately without Soren, to pretty much continue her mission, partially. Except instead of bringing Callum back, she'd be helping him return the baby dragon. Unless he wanted to go home.

Though, she was curious as to how she was supposed to get across. She didn't have to think about it for long after she arrived, sometime late at night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of this chapter is just from canon and I guess the rest is putting Claudia with them.
> 
> Mostly so I can get to the parts I have planned.


	5. distractions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia tries to convince Callum and Rayla to trust her.

It took a long time to find Callum and the elf, which she hadn't expected. She didn't leave that much after them, but they seemed to move pretty fast as she had a hard time catching up.

She didn't know where they were and unfortunately, she didn't have what she needed to track them. Claudia didn't even know where she would get all of that here.

There was one thing she could definitely say, though, which was that it was pretty much what she expected. Claudia was occasionally distracted by the scenery, probably a lot more than she should be.

While it took a long time to find them, she eventually did. It was further than she expected to find them, though it looked like a good place to rest.

Rayla seemed to be fond of showing off her speed, or sword or something, whatever it was in particular she was showing off at the moment, because she was very quick to pull out her weapon to, presuambly, use against Claudia.

"Claudia?" Callum asked, confused.

"Hey, Callum." Claudia said, and looked at Rayla's weapon, "Am I interrupting something? Some sort of... thing that would involve a sword?"

"Nope, you're just in time." Rayla replied.

"Claudia, why are you here?"

"And where's Soren?" Rayla added in.

"Soren? He went with Ez. Ezran also said you guys might need some help?" Claudia answered.

"We don't need your help."

Claudia looked at Callum, and he sighed, "I don't think its a good idea, either. After last time..."

She looked back at Rayla briefly, who stared at her angrily, "I know we betrayed you, and I'm sorry, and we really didn't want to. But we had to try to get you back home. It's too dangerous here."

"It is dangerous. But we have Rayla, and I can use magic again and-"

"But it's still really dangerous, Callum," Claudia told him, "And if you're not going to go home with Ezran, than you should at least have me or Soren or something."

"You should go back, Claudia."

"Callum." She attempted to argue, "It's too dangeorus."

"You can't come with us. You should go back home." Callum said, before turning to Rayla, "We should go."

They started walking away, Rayla keeping her eye on Claudia in the process, or at least until they were far enough that she couldn't attack. Claudia started following them after that.

* * *

Following them turned out to be pretty difficult, mostly because Claudia really didn't know that much about her surroundings and there was a lot of things that were just distracting. There were a lot of things she hadn't seen before.

There was also avoiding the elves. Soren was right, there were a lot of elves who hated them. He was pretty accurate about that. Which was unfortunate.

* * *

She was right about how dangerous it was.

Callum wasn't particularly pleased about that fact, after the elves saw him. Sort of. It was very brief. Rayla told him to stay behind a rock.

"Hey." Rayla said, casually, seemingly pretending to be the only one there. They asked her something that Callum didn't hear.

"Nope, just me." He heard her say, relatively loudly. He didn't hear what else she said, it was interrupted by something else.

"Callum."

He turned around to see Claudia, and asked quietly, "What are you doing here? You were supposed to go home."

"Doesn't mean I'm going to. Come on," She grabbed his hand, and moved him away from the rock he was hiding behind quickly, like she had a plan.

"Claudia, what are you doing? We're gonna get caught."

She didn't answer, and moved past the elves that were distracted with Rayla, who did seem to notice them and told the elves she had to leave, following them.

They didn't say anything until they had gotten relatively far away. Callum sat down on the grass, and then almost immediately lied down in it.

"What are you doing here?" Rayla asked.

Claudia smiled at her, "I came to help."

"We already told you, we don't need your help."

Callum sat up, "You should've gone home."

"I'm not leaving, Callum." Claudia said, "And I'm just going to keep following you until you let me help."

He sighed, "Claudia..."

"We have no reason to trust you." Rayla pointed out, "You and Soren lied to us and betrayed Callum and Ezran."

"We didn't want to have to betray you guys. But we tried to do it my way and it didn't work, so we had to do it his way." Claudia attempted to explain, "I didn't come here to betray you guys. I came here to help my friends."

"You still can't come with us, Claudia. Betraying us was one thing, and then the dragon and... We can't trust you."

Claudia sighed, staring at Rayla and Callum. She had to figure something out, something to convince them to let her help, to convince them she wouldn't betray them again or anything like that. Then, she remembered something Ezran had said.

"Well, maybe I could teach you some primal magic, at least?"

"Primal magic?" Callum questioned.

"Ezran said you could do that now, right? I still know a few things from when I had my primal stone." Claudia said, "And if you're not going to let me help you, you should at least let me teach you some more magic."

Rayla took Callum a little bit further away to talk, though their conversation seemed short.

"Okay, I guess you can teach me some primal magic."

"Great!" Claudia smiled, "We can start later tonight if you want."

"Tonight?"

"Well, yeah. I mean, unless you wanted to do it tomorrow night."

"Are you trying to get us to let you stay?"

"Maybe," She smiled again, "Or maybe it's just something you'd do at night, when there's hopefully a little less elves around and ideally, it's less noticeable."

"Is that why?" Callum asked.

"I guess you'll see."


	6. procrastination

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia starts teaching Callum primal magic.

Later that night, Claudia started telling Callum about the primal magic she knew, and teaching it to him.

"So, what primal magic do you know, Callum?"

"Well, there's the two you already showed me. But, uh, aside from that I don't really know any." He answered, though Claudia was sure she only remembered showing him the one.

"I showed you two?"

"Yeah, well, I mean technically you only showed me the first part of the lightning spell when you were trying to use it on Rayla, but" Callum explained, "We did eventually figure out the rest of it."

"Ah." Claudia said, "Hmm, well, I don't know that much primal magic, but my dad did teach me how to do an ice spell."

"An ice spell?"

"Yeah, although it's kind of a big spell." Claudia looked at their surroundings, "I'm not sure if this place is really going to be big enough."

"Oh. Is there anywhere else we could do, or anything else you know?"

"Yeah... But I think we might run into a similar problem."

She looked into the distance, deep in thought. A lot of the things she knew how to do with primal magic would require a bigger area to do them in without getting caught.

Claudia remembered her conversation with Ezran, once again.

"It's pretty cool you don't need a primal stone anymore, Callum," Claudia told him, "You know, I didn't hear the full story to that."

"It is kind of a long story. I mean, I was talking to Lujanne and she said that humans weren't born connected to a primal source, so I made my own connection."

"How did you do that?" She asked.

Callum's explaination was confusing, and she honestly didn't understand most of it.

"Huh. Maybe you should teach me sometime." Claudia suggested.

"Yeah, maybe." He agreed.

Rayla watched the whole conversation, keeping an eye on Claudia.

She knew she had to be up to something again.

Rayla wasn't sure what Claudia was up to, but she was sure it was something. But she wouldn't be able to. She was probably lying to them again, but she and Callum had talked about it briefly.

Claudia was probably going to keep following them, and they couldn't really stop her. But she said she could teach Callum some more primal magic. Though, she wasn't sure if they were doing that. It mostly just looked like they were talking.

It would definitely be useful for Callum to know a little bit more. Claudia was right when she said it was dangerous, and there was a chance that Rayla might not be able to help Callum sometimes.

Still, Rayla couldn't believe Claudia would betray her own friends.

And she couldn't believe she fell for it. Even when she knew they were lying, she almost started to understand when Callum said it was Soren who lied to him, because she was getting to know Claudia. But she was right.

Zym walked up to Rayla, and she pet the baby dragon, "What do you think?"

He looked up to her confused, like he wasn't sure what in particular she was referring to or maybe he just didn't know why she asked his opinion. Zym attempted to play, and she smiled at him.

Callum walked up and sat down, "So, Rayla."

She turned towards him.

"Claudia told me about some of the spells she wants to teach me."

"So she taught you?"

"Well... No, not yet."

"Great." Rayla said, sarcastically.

"I know." Callum sighed, "She said we need a bigger area, so she might have to stick with us if I'm going to learn primal magic."

"She's probably just lying so she can betray you again."

Callum looked down, "Maybe."

Rayla stared at Claudia. She was sitting in the grass, for some reason. Rayla wasn't sure what she was up to, but it seemed to be taking awhile.

It was late, and Claudia didn't really feel like going to sleep.

Rayla didn't seem to, either, she noticed. She was staring at Claudia, probably because she didn't trust her.

It had actually been quite awhile since she had talked to Rayla, so she walked up to the tree that Rayla was sitting in, "Hey."

"What are you doing?" Rayla questioned, jumping down from the tree.

"I was trying to have a conversation." Claudia smiled, "I haven't really talked to you, and since you're up anyway, we might as well, right?"

"No."

"Okay." Claudia sighed, and started to walk away.

"What are you up to?"

Claudia turned around to look at Rayla. She seemed like she was ready to pull out her weapons and fight her, even though Claudia had no intention of fighting her, or betraying her or anything.

"What do you mean?" Claudia asked.

"I know you're up to something and you're just going to betray him again."

"I'm not going to do that." Claudia said, "I'm not up to anything. I'm just trying to help by teaching Callum some primal magic."

"You haven't even taught him anything yet." She replied.

"I would have, but this area isn't big enough." Claudia pointed out, "They could all pretty much completely destroy it, and it seems a little late to find a new place to stay."

Claudia walked away. Rayla wasn't going to trust her anytime soon, she barely even trusted her before she betrayed them. Callum didn't even really trust her, and they had know each other for a long time.

It wasn't going to be easy to convince them they could trust her. But if they were in danger and they needed her help, she was there to help them, at least.

She might be able to convince them to let her stay around them for a couple of days to teach Callum primal magic, but she wasn't sure if she could convince them to let her go with them in that amount of time. She could definitely try, though.

Afterall, Callum and Ezran hadn't trusted Rayla immediately, but they still went with her.


	7. ice cold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia teaches Callum magic.

Claudia ended up going with them for the day, even though they didn't really want her to. But Callum learning magic could be extremely helpful, in case they ran into any elves who didn't particularly like Callum. Which, unfortunately, seemed pretty likely.

"Claudia?" Callum asked, looking behind him at Claudia. She appeared to be getting a little bit distracted. He walked over to her, in an attempt to see what was so distracting.

"Look." She said, staring at something, "These are really rare."

"That's nice, Claudia." Callum pulled her away from whatever it was, "But uh, I don't think we really have time for distractions."

"He's right," Rayla added, "Let's just find a place for you two to do magic so you can leave."

She sighed, "Okay."

* * *

Claudia really couldn't help all of the feelings she got. She knew they were right not to trust her, but she still couldn't help but feel bad, or disappointed whenever they talked about her leaving.

She had actually started warming up to Rayla, too. Callum and Ezran had kept talking about how if they just had a conversation, they'd probably become friends.

Claudia hadn't been sure about that, but when she  _did_  talk to Rayla, she could sort of imagine it. Not like they were really _friends_  - still had awhile to go there - but not really enemies. They were getting somewhere.

It was part of the reason she didn't want to do it Soren's way, the main reason of course being betraying her friends, and the fact that these were their friends and they would not like it. But if it went wrong, like it did, it'd be difficult for Callum, Ezran and Rayla to trust them again. And she didn't know if Rayla had even trusted them the first time, even a little bit.

They had been sent out on a mission, and they had to do that mission. But Claudia was hoping that maybe it'd count if they returned with the princes after they returned Zym.

She really wanted Callum to trust her again. She wasn't sure, but Ezran seemed to, since he was the one who suggested her going to help Callum and Rayla. He was her friend, and they had known each other for a long time.

They were the reason she considered trusting Rayla, because they trusted her. Though, now, Rayla trusting her seemed unlikely.

Claudia sighed. She had no idea how she was going to convince them to trust her again.

* * *

They had been walking for awhile, though there were plenty distractions. Claudia pointed out various magical creatures to Callum, and sometimes plants.

Sometimes, they just seemed to be distracted in their various conversations.

"Callum."

"Yeah?" He asked, turning towards her. He seemed to notice she was further than he was, and caught up. Claudia looked at whatever distraction it was this quickly before following him.

"Come on." Rayla said, continuing walking, "You can't keep getting distracted."

"Right," Claudia replied, before pointing out, "You know, over there looks big enough for me to teach you those spells, Callum."

"Really?" Callum questioned.

"At least one of them." She added.

Rayla sighed, as they all went towards where Claudia had pointed out. It was a pretty big area, somewhere they probably wouldn't get caught.

She sat down, watching as Claudia started teaching him magic. She did a quick drawing of what Callum would be doing.

"Let's start with the ice spell I mentioned. I'm not sure how useful it'll be, you might not be in the right situation." Claudia explained, "But it's still pretty cool to know it, even if you don't end up using it, right?"

"Yeah." Callum agreed, "So this is the first part of it?"

"Yep." She smiled, and and told him how to do the rest of it. Rayla watched as Callum attempted it. Claudia seemed to be right about needing a big area, she noticed, as the ice was pretty big.

"Whoa."

"Wow, you really got the hang of that quickly." Claudia said.

Callum smiled, "Yeah, I guess."

"It's pretty cool, right?" Claudia asked, "I'm sure you'll find a great use for it here."

"Probably. So, what other spells can you teach me?"

She glanced at Rayla, "You know, you should probably work on that one for now. I mean, you should probably get back to returning Zym."

Zym ran around Claudia and Callum, presumably attempting to play. Or just get their attention. Claudia picked him up and proceeded to remind him how adorable he was.

Rayla walked over to her and gently took the dragon out of her hands.

"That's a good point, I guess." Callum agreed, "And we probably shouldn't stay here too long."

"Exactly." Claudia smiled, and turned towards Rayla, "So, we should go?"

Rayla sighed, "Fine."

They were right. Returning Zym was more important, even though she wanted them to get that whole magic thing out of the way so they didn't have to have Claudia around. Rayla didn't know what she was up to, but she had to be up to something.

It seemed like she was trying to get them to let her go with them, at least for a couple of days. And Rayla wasn't going to let her do whatever it was she was planning on doing.

While Claudia walked beside Callum, she kept an eye on her.

* * *

She was surprised at how fast Callum had gotten the hang of that spell. Claudia didn't expect him to get it so quickly. Though, she was glad they all agreed with her on the other spells. She just needed a few more days, and maybe she could convince them to let her help them.

If they didn't, at least Callum would know a few more spells, though. Even if she didn't convince them to trust her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey how long does a fanfiction have to be to be called a 'slow burn'?


	8. friendship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla, Callum and Claudia continue their journey.

Claudia was starting to find it was a lot easier to have a conversation with Callum than it was with Rayla. It was probably because he knew her, or maybe because of how long he knew her. I mean, she had only betrayed him that _one_  time.

Unless you counted that one time she and Soren tried helped Ezran scare him. But to be fair, Ez really wanted to surprise him. And Claudia, being a younger sibling, understood. Because she understood, she even convinced Soren to help.

Though, as it turns out, you really can't sneak up on Callum. If he was at all startled, it was because he didn't expect Soren and Claudia to be there.

Callum didn't really particularly appreciate the gesture, kind of in a 'you just betrayed me by doing this' way. She didn't think he was serious, but you never really know.

But since Ezran wasn't able to sneak up on his older brother, Claudia helped him sneak up on hers.

It was a little disappointing Ezran wasn't going with them.

Another thing that made it easier to talk to Callum was that even if he didn't trust her, it wasn't that noticeable. It seemed like they were a little more distant than they used to be, but it wasn't like with Rayla.

Sometimes, she wasn't sure why she wanted Rayla to trust her. Claudia hadn't really talked to her a lot in the past few days, she didn't feel like anyone saying she was going to betray them again.

It frustrated her a little, honestly. Rayla was very clear about how she wanted her to teach Callum the primal magic she knew and leave.

Claudia tried to think of the conversations she and Rayla had, the ones that made her consider actually going with them. The ones where she trusted Callum and Ezran's choice in friends. Or how afterwards, Rayla sat near her and smiled at her.

But it all seemed weird now, like maybe that Rayla was an illusion, like the ones that the person who owned the moon phoenix made. But those mostly seemed to involve worms, or giant spiders.

Rayla didn't like like her, and she didn't trust her. But when she thought about it, she thought she might even understand. She wanted to protect her friends, and that was a similarity they had.

That was why Claudia had come here, and that's why she followed them after they didn't let her go with them. That was the reason she had to trust Rayla. Maybe it'd be the reason Rayla had to trust her.

* * *

"Come on." Rayla said, which seemed to be something she was fond of.

Claudia and Callum walked a little bit faster to keep up with her, though it was difficult with how fast she was going. Rayla seemed to be naturally faster than them regardless of if she was using it for fighting. It was impressive, but still relatively annoying.

She sighed, "So, Callum. You can only do sky primal magic, right?"

"Yeah?" He turned to Claudia, still attempting to keep up with Rayla.

"Have you thought of which one you want to learn next?" Claudia asked, "Like, are you going to learn moon magic, too? Or maybe ocean? Or do you just wanna stick with sky?"

"I hadn't really thought about it." Callum said, he had just been happy to be able to do magic again, and he hadn't really been thinking about if he was going to learn the other ones, if he could.

"Well, you should, I mean, there's so many things you could do." She smiled, "And if you're going to learn some magic, this is probably one of the best places to do it."

"Yeah, maybe. Do you think I can even learn multiple?"

"Sure. Why wouldn't you be able to?" She asked, "I think if anyone can learn multiple primal sources, it's probably you."

Callum smiled briefly, "Thanks, Claudia."

"On another topic..." Claudia smiled, "Did I ever tell you about that time Soren tried to fight a moon moth?"

* * *

Rayla watched while Claudia talked wtih Callum, keeping an eye on Claudia. She was starting to think Callum might be starting to trust her again.

She could understand why, considering they had been friends for years and all that, and Claudia still talked to him like a friend, almost like she hadn't betrayed him at all.

They were laughing at one of the stories Claudia was telling, probably being louder than they should be. It was annoying how Claudia kept acting like she was his friend, like she wasn't going to betray him again.

It seemed like she was the only one who was focused on bringing Zym back to his mom. She walked faster, making sure she could see the baby dragon and Callum.

Claudia walked very casually alongside Callum, ignoring the fact she betrayed him. Callum didn't seem concerned that she might do it again, and that was concerning.

They stopped trying to keep up with her for a few minutes, seemingly distracted with their conversation, so she turned around to remind them, "Callum, come on."

"Oh, right." He said, walking faster. Claudia did, too, for some reason. She seemed intent on going with them, and though Rayla wasn't sure why yet, she assumed it had something to do with betraying Callum and taking him home, and stealing Zym.

Though, Zym seemed to like Claudia, in a way. Maybe because he hadn't known Claudia as long and she was nice to him, despite what she said about him while he was an egg.

"So, how far away are we from Zym's mom?"

"Well..." Rayla turned towards them, "Pretty far. And there's a chance we might run into some elves on the way."

"Oh. That's fun." Callum commented, sarcastically.

"Yep." She turned away from them, and continued walking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> is anyone really prepared for what I have planned? I guess I'l find out, like maybe 10? 20? updates later? provided I don't end up giving up on this one.


	9. dragon best friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia struggles with getting them to trust her.

It had been a few days since Claudia had started going with them to teach Callum some primal magic. It was getting difficult since neither of them trusted her, and she still couldn't have a conversation with Rayla. Well, at least one where she didn't mention the betrayal.

They had stopped for the night, making sure to choose an area they wouldn't be seen easily. It was a good area for Callum to continue working on the ice spell, though he'd probably be doing that in the morning when they were leaving.

"I think I'm starting to get the hang of that ice spell." Callum commented.

"Yeah." Claudia agreed, "Maybe I'll teach you one of the other spells tomorrow."

"Really?" He asked, "That'd be great!"

Rayla approached them, sitting down next to Callum and staring at Claudia, "Yeah, then you could leave."

Claudia felt her heart sink a little at this comment, though ignoring it as she hesitantly replied, "Yeah. I could."

Though, she did add, quietly, "If you could protect Callum..."

She wasn't sure if Rayla heard it, as she didn't mention it. She mostly just kept staring at Claudia. So she stared back.

"Well, uh," Callum interrupted, "About that. Are you going to be able to get back on your own?"

A part of her wanted to say 'no', but it's not like she knew that for a fact. She got pretty far on her own, and might have even been able to continue if she hadn't convince them to let her travel with them for awhile.

She didn't want to lie, either, even though it could help her travel with them, "Uh... Probably."

"Probably?" Callum questioned, a little bit concerned.

"Yeah. I think I can do it."

"Maybe I should start teaching you how to do primal magic without a primal stone or something. I mean, I did break yours..."

"You never did tell me that story." Claudia said, "Actually, you didn't tell me a lot of stories."

"Oh, yeah. Maybe we'll do that sometime."

Rayla leaned in a bit closer to Callum, and whispered, "And maybe she can start teaching you the other spells so she can leave?" Rayla whispered, "You know, since we can't trust her?"

Claudia pretended she didn't here that, since Rayla was 'polite' enough to whisper. Callum glanced at her, and she smiled obliviously, even if she wasn't.

"Maybe it was a one time thing?" Callum whispered back, "I mean we can't just leave her. What if she gets caught?"

"She's the one who followed us here." Rayla pointed out, "And I'm sure she'll be fine. But she was going to kidnap you, Ezran and Zym last time, remember?"

Claudia wanted to add in that it was Soren's idea and she suggested they actually help them, anyway, insteading of just pretending to because it just kinda made more sense. But she didn't. Rayla wouldn't believe her, anyway.

* * *

She stood up, not particularly feeling up to listening to their conversation. Claudia walked over towards Zym and sat down, letting them talk privately. She was far away enough so that they probably didn't even have to whisper.

"Hello." She smiled, "What are you up to?"

Zym made cute little noises, as though he was attempting to tell her, but Ez was the one who could talk to animals. Claudia sighed. It would have been great if Ezran was here with them.

"You miss Ezran too, don't you?" She asked, gently petting the dragon, "Maybe it's because he let me talk to him, or how he helped me find what I needed to have Soren but he didn't seem that mad at me about the betrayal or the dragon thing."

He looked up Claudia, confused.

"Kind of like you. But it's not like you could talk to Callum. It's really been really difficult trying to get them to trust me. I don't know how to do it. And... I don't have Soren."

Not having Soren around, now that was strange. It wasn't like she could go and ask him for suggestions, even if his answer was usually 'muscle'. It was kind of like what her mom told her, that she and Soren needed each other.

Claudia stared into the distant for a moment, before turning back towards Zym, "He even suggested that I come here." She added, "So I could help protect Callum. And that maybe me and Rayla could still be friends, though somehow I don't think that's going to happen."

"What about you?" She asked him, "Are you my friend?"

Zym made more cute noises, which she assumed might mean 'yes'.

"You are so cute." She reminded him. She was going to give him some more compliments, but she was interrupted by Rayla walking over and taking him out of her hands.

"Hey!"

Callum walked over, too. He stood near Rayla, and honestly looked a little confused, "Rayla? What's going on?"

"She was holding Zym," Rayla explained, "I know she's up to something, Callum. I'm sure you do, too."

"Well, maybe she is." Callum said, "But it kinda just looked like she was cuddling him."

"I doubt it." Rayla replied, "We can't trust her, and we can't let her near Zym."

Claudia sighed, and stood up, "You know, you could just ask me not to hold him."

"Yeah, exactly." Callum agreed, "We can ask her first."

Rayla turned towards Claudia, "Fine. Could you stay away from Zym, as we can't trust you not to steal him?"

Her tone was pretty sarcastic, which wasn't very nice. It was only the one time she betrayed them, and she didn't even want to.

"Yeah, fine." She agreed relunctantly, "But is it really fair to Zym? Who is going to tell him how cute he is?"

Zym made cute noises which she chose to take as a 'She's right. I am small and squishy', though she was probably way off.

Rayla glanced at Callum, "Well, you can do that, right?"

"I guess."

* * *

Claudia sighed as they walked away. Zym seemed like he was her friend, and she didn't have a lot of people right now. Soren was going home with Ezran, and she really couldn't tell if Callum trusted her.

Rayla didn't want her to interact with Zym, and Claudia could understand that. But it was still disappointing. Maybe she'd be able to convince them, soon, and then she'd be able to talk to Zym again.

Maybe she'd even be able to talk to Rayla again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am very fond of comments. I love them. 
> 
> also I am really procrastinating on Callum learning those spells. I have yet to come up with anything for him to learn.


	10. trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia attempts to explain things to Callum and Rayla

Claudia sat near Callum, underneath a tree while she watched as Zym ran around and ignoring how much she kinda just wanted to squish him. But in a good way.

"So, that's what happened to your primal stone." Callum finished explaining, "And that's how we got Zym."

Claudia glanced at him, smiling, "So I was right about it being a good reason."

"Yeah, you were." Callum agreed, though he seemed to notice her watching Zym as he added, "I'm sorry Rayla doesn't want you near Zym anymore, by the way."

"That's okay. I understand she doesn't have any reason to trust me."

"Well, why doesn't she?" Callum asked, "Why did you and Soren try to kidnap us? Why did you guys pick a fight with a dragon?"

"I don't know." Claudia said, casually, "It kinda seemed like the best idea at the time. With the dragon flying around the town that way and all."

It didn't now, though. Maybe because they didn't succeed, or because Soren got hurt or maybe because it didn't do great for getting their friends to trust them again. They seemed against fighting dragons.

"And kidnapping us?"

"It was the only option to get you to go home with us. I mean, at some point we had to try it the Soren way." She answered, "You know, everyone was so worried about you. We all though you were kidnapped by an elf."

"But we told you and Soren she was our friend." Callum argued, "Couldn't you explain it to them?"

"It's not the most believeable story, Callum. Your aunt seemed pretty sure you were kidnapped for some reason."

"Right. Probably because I said that."

She turned towards him, "Why would you tell your aunt she kidnapped you?"

"I don't know. It just seemed like..." Callum didn't finish the rest of his sentence, looking down.

"Like the best option?"

"Yeah... It's like you said, it's not the most believeable story." He said, "And with the way she talked about moonshadow elves?"

"Not your best idea." Claudia smiled, "So how did Rayla feel about that? Did you tell her beforehand or...?"

"Uh, well, not great." He answered, "She was pretty mad about it... You know, I guess we've both made some decision we probably shouldn't have."

"Yeah." Claudia agreed, "Hey, Callum...?"

"Yeah, Claudia?"

"Do you trust me?"

Callum looked at Claudia, though she wasn't looking in his direction, "Why?"

"I know a few days ago you said you couldn't. I guess I just wanted to know if anythings changed. I mean, I haven't even really used 'my kind of magic' here."

"I don't know." He replied, "I think. Maybe. But honestly, I don't know if I do. Rayla kept telling me we couldn't trust you and Soren and I didn't listen and she was right. And you almost took us back home."

"I know. And I am so, so sorry."

"I know. But I just thought I knew you better than she did." Callum sighed, looking down at Zym who had apparently decided to sleep on his leg.

"You do." Claudia replied, "You do know us better than she does. And you know her better than we do."

"Yeah. We were really hoping you'd get to know her better. But I guess now..."

Claudia sighed, looking down.

"Why aren't you two trying to get along?" He asked, "Back when you first caught up with us, it seemed like... Like you were getting somewhere."

"We were. We were at least starting. And it's not like I haven't tried to talk to her. It's that she's not trying to talk to me."

"You should keep trying." Callum suggested, "Maybe it'd be a little easier if it didn't seem like you two were fighting all the time."

"Yeah, okay." Claudia said, "You know, I have to admit it was pretty cool she used a flower to stay awake. I mean, a flower. I never expected it, but I guess it explained why she was holding one."

"Wait, what happened?"

"Oh right, you missed that part." Claudia remembered, "So after we caught up to you guys with the tracking spell..."

* * *

Rayla walked around pointlessly, keeping an eye out in case anyone was going to attack Callum. He was talking to Claudia again, and she honestly didn't see the point. All that was going to happen was he was going to get attached to her, if he hadn't already.

Claudia seemed to notice Rayla, time to time, sometimes she even smiled, seemingly in an attempt to convince her to trust her so she could do whatever it was she had planned.

She couldn't see any other reason why Claudia would smile at her, anyway. Rayla was very clear about not smiling at Claudia. If she was attempting to be nice or something, it wasn't going the way she was planning.

Which was good, because she doubted anything that Claudia planned could be good.

* * *

Later on during the day, Claudia approached her to talk. She didn't know why she bothered, Rayla thought she was making it very clear she wasn't going to fall for it.

"Hey." Claudia said, in the same sort of way she might say it to Callum, as though they were friends.

"What?" Rayla questioned, reminding her again that she wasn't convinced.

"Can I sit?" Claudia asked, glancing at the area near Rayla. She didn't reply, mostly just staring at Claudia as she leaned back on the tree.

Claudia sat down anyways, regardless of an answer. She didn't say anything, for whatever reason. She just sat there, looking into the distance for several minutes until she eventually decided to talk.

"You know, I'd never hurt Callum."

"You already did." She pointed out, "You hurt Callum and Ezran."

"I know." Claudia said, and she almost looked... not particular pleased about that particular thing, "And I'm sorry. We never wanted to hurt them."

Rayla didn't respond.

"I know this isn't saying a lot, that we didn't want to. I don't really have a lot to say about it, though."

Claudia glanced at Rayla, "I know this isn't going to convince you and I know you're right not to trust me. But Soren  _and_  Ezran both thought I should come here, and while I'm here teaching Callum magic, shouldn't we try to get along?"

Rayla remembered a similar conversation she had with Claudia, before Claudia had betrayed them.

"We don't have to. It's not like you're going with us, you're only here to teach Callum magic." Rayla said, "Then you can leave."

She walked away from Claudia. She wasn't going to fall for it.


	11. human rayla

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla shows off her human impersonation.

Claudia attempted to talk to Rayla a few more times, but she ignored her. Rayla had no intention to fall for it, though Claudia was certainly trying to convince her.

While they walked, it seemed Claudia wasn't going to be her biggest concern, as she noticed there were some noises up ahead that meant elves might be involved. Rayla continued walking hesitantly, and similarly, Callum and Claudia did.

"We're getting close..." Rayla mentioned, quietly.

"Close?" Callum questioned.

"To where I'm from. We're going to have to be extra careful from now on." She explained.

"Right." Callum said, "So there's going to be other moonshadow elves? Can't we go around or something?"

"We could." Rayla replied, "Or, we could get you a disguise while we're there so you won't be caught as easily."

"A disguise? Great, I'll work on my elf impression, Elf Callum."

"No, no impressions. Just don't say anything."

"Why not? I think I'd do great elf impression." Callum argued, "Probably even better than Human Rayla impersonates a human."

"Human Rayla?" Claudia questioned.

"Right. You never met human Rayla." Callum remembered, "Which is a shame, because it's really hard to explain otherwise. I think the best explanation would be for Rayla to show you. Rayla, why don't you show Claudia your human impression."

"We don't have time for that."

"Yeah we do." Callum argued, "You don't even have to come up with new things to say as Human Rayla. Come on, you love Human Rayla."

"Fine." Rayla sighed, and put on a disguise, "Hello, fellow human. Human fellows."

Rayla's tone wasn't as enthuastic as it usually was when doing Human Rayla, which she definitely seemed to love doing, but that didn't seem to bother Claudia, who seemed kinda... amazed with human Rayla.

"I sure do love procrastinating. And getting distracted when I'm in a hurry."

Claudia attempted to laugh quietly, but appeared to be having some difficult, "That's so accurate!"

"Totally, my fellow human." She said, "Let's go complain with the other humans, and exchange our strange assumptions about elves."

Claudia continued to laugh, like it was really funny, which Callum didn't understand, "That's so true! Like moonshadow madness!"

Rayla took the disguise off, unfortunately, and looked at Claudia confused, as did Callum. Claudia finally stopped laughing, and noticing their confusion, explained, "Oh, some weird thing Soren heard about. Trust me, it's ridiculous."

"Okay then."

Claudia stood up, with some difficulty, "So that was Human Rayla. You know, I can see how you guys didn't get caught."

"I'm surprised that we didn't immediately get caught." Callum added in.

"Why? Her impersonation was  _so_  accurate."

Rayla smiled briefly, "Well, we should continue."

"Maybe she can teach you how to do an impersonation like that." Claudia suggested, walking next to Callum, "For your disguise."

"She doesn't need to teach me." Callum argued, "Just wait until you meet Elf Callum."

* * *

As they got closer, Rayla was starting to get a better look at the elves. They definitely seemed to have weapons, which would be a problem if they noticed them. Which they did, unfortunately.

"Hey?" One of them asked, though they seemed a little confused, "Is that a human?"

"Nope." Rayla said, quickly covering them up with what she had previously been using as her disguise, "No humans here."

"Okay." The elf replied, "You know, you don't have to be so weird about it. It just looked like there might be some humans."

"Why would there be humans?"

"Exactly." The same elf replied, "Whatever, though, I have to go tell that to my friend over there."

The other elf stared at them, and then pulled off the disguise, "Unless these were humans."

"You know, I don't really want to deal with humans." The previous elf commented, "I'm sure this child is perfectly capable of handling it herself."

The other elf pulled out its weapons, "Do what you want. I'm fighting them."

Rayla pulled out her own weapons, and stood in front of Claudia and Callum, "No, you're not. Callum, take Zym and run."

Callum grabbed the dragon and did just that, and then glanced at Claudia, "Claudia, come on."

Claudia looked at Callum, and then at Rayla as even more elves surrounded her, probably after noticing the the other two,"Hold on... I have an idea."

"Claudia, whatever you're thinking, don't do it!" Callum suggested, and grabbed her hand, "We need to go!"

"We can't leave her there." Claudia said, as he dragged her away.

"I know." He replied, and then put Zym in her hands, "Claudia, get Zym to safety. I'll go get Rayla."

"Callum!" Claudia shouted, watching as he ran back towards Rayla. Other elves started to notice her, so she ran. Callum asked her to get Zym to safety, so that's what she was going to do... But at the same time, she needed to protect Callum. Her friend.

Zym was also her friend, though, and Callum could protect himself to some extent and Rayla was there. But still, if he needed her help, she'd be there.

* * *

"Callum, what are you doing?" Rayla asked, after noticing he was still there. She fought off one elf and dodged an attack from another, though she was definitely out-numbered.

"I think it's time I tested out that new spell I've been working on." Callum answered.

"Right..." Rayla smiled, as another elf started going towards Callum. She stopped the elf with her sword, pushing them back. At the same time, there were an awful lot of arrows to deal with...

"Rayla, get out of there!" Callum shouted, as he started the first part. Rayla decided to use a move that Soren was sure was not a thing in sword fighting, knocking over one of the elves which temporarily distracted the others, allowing her to run towards Callum.

"Aspiro frigis!"

The elves seemed to have some difficulties with the ice Callum had created, which gave them the opportunity to run away.

"Where's Zym?" Rayla asked, once they were a little bit away.

"He's with Claudia." Callum said.

"Wait, what? Why is Zym with Claudia?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> human rayla is difficult to write. I am not looking forward to elf callum, whatever elf callum is. I guess I will have to figure that out.
> 
> or the inevitably approaching tinker..


	12. distance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla and Callum search for Claudia.

They didn't immediately find Claudia, which worried Rayla.

"She probably ran off with Zym." She said, as they walked around, "I told you we can't trust her."

"I know. But maybe we can." Callum replied. He wasn't that sure about it right now, but she sounded so... worried. Like she wanted to make sure Rayla was okay, too, even if they didn't get along.

"There's no way we'd be able to trust her, we can't even find her."

It was getting late, which was making it more difficult to see. Rayla had a point, they couldn't even find her. If she ran off with Zym today, they might not be able to get Zym back.

Callum sighed, "There's no way we're going to find her tonight."

"No, there isn't." Rayla agreed, "No way you're going to find her. You stay here."

"You're going after her?"

"She has Zym. I have to. Just... Stay here, maybe more over there where no one can see you." Rayla gestured, "Just stay."

"Okay... Just be careful."

_Oh no, foiled again_. She thought, though it wasn't really the time for that.

* * *

Claudia stopped to catch her breath, briefly, before continuing to keep moving. Zym moved around in her arms, wanting to get out.

"I know." She told the baby dragon, "You'll be able to walk around soon, okay? I just need to find somewhere... safer."

It had been several hours since they had ran into elves and unfortunately gotten separated. She had managed to outrun those elves, somehow, but mostly because she kept moving.

Claudia didn't know if they were keeping an eye out for her, but since she was a human and she wasn't supposed to be here, it seemed possible.

She didn't know if Callum was able to stop them with the ice spell, either. Claudia was starting to worry, they hadn't caught up yet. Maybe she went too far, but she didn't think she did.

With how late it was, she was starting to have trouble seeing, but it looked like... There might be some sort of cave up ahead. Claudia approached it, curious.

"That's perfect." Claudia said, "Okay, I'm going to set you down now, but you have to stay close."

Zym made noises in response. Claudia set him down and pointed out her hand. She turned on her light, allowing her to see inside the cave.

"Come on." She smiled at Zym, walking inside the cave. Zym followed her into the cave, running after her. It was probably nice for Zym to finally get to run around.

* * *

Rayla sighed, sitting on a tree branch. The sun was starting to rise, but she still hadn't found Claudia. She jumped down from the tree branch, and started to go back to where Callum was. Maybe Claudia was with him...

She wasn't, unfortunately. Callum turned around to see her, and sighed.

"So I'm guessing you didn't find Claudia?"

"Nope." Rayla sat down, "She must have gone far."

Callum sighed, "I'm sorry. I thought we could trust her."

"I know." She leaned against a tree, thinking about where Claudia could possibly be. Maybe she found somewhere... Maybe she had some trouble with elves, too.

"We can't stop looking." Callum stood up, "I'm going to go find her. You should stay here."

"Callum, wait." Rayla stood up as well, immediately catching up with him.

"We have to find her. I mean, she and Zym could have been attacked or..." Callum said, "I have to go find her."

"Not alone."

"I'm the one who told her to protect Zym."

Rayla ignored him, walking alongside him as they searched. They didn't get to go very far before they heard a noise. Rayla stopped Callum from walking any further, listening...

"Oh, great." Callum commented, sarcastically, "Are we going to get attacked?"

A small, baby dragon ran out from around the area they heard the noise. He ran towards Rayla and Callum.

"Zym?" Callum asked, "Then where's..."

Glancing at the area they previously heard the noise, there was soon a human there, "Oh, good, you're okay. You found them, Zym."

Claudia walked over towards them, smiling.

"Wait, Claudia, where were you?" Callum questioned, "We couldn't find you."

Claudia shrugged, "Guess we went a bit too far."

Rayla stared at Claudia, confused. Rayla wasn't sure what Claudia was up to, but wouldn't this have been a great opportunity? If she had Zym, they'd have to go after her, even if she went back home...

"How far?" Rayla asked.

Claudia glanced behind her, "I mean, pretty far. We found a cave to hide from the elves in..."

"I'm glad to see you guys are okay, though." She added, smiling. Zym ran around Rayla, who picked him up. She stared at Claudia, who smiled.

"So, uh," Claudia said, "Should we get going?"

"Yeah..."

She was still surprised by Claudia looking for them. Honestly, she expected to have to fight Claudia. It just didn't make sense for Claudia to come back... Whatever she was planning mostly just seemed to be confusing.

Rayla turned around and started walking in a different direction, towards where she lived. She felt kind of weird going back home after everything that happened, and seeing Tinker again. After her mission and all... And she was returning with two humans and a baby dragon.

That was going to be an interesting story to tell, and probably a pretty long one. Honestly, she wasn't looking forward to it just yet. But if she could convince Tinker to help them, then they wouldn't have to worry about getting caught so much. As long as Callum didn't talk.

As they approached where she lived, and many other moonshadow elves did as well, Rayla wasn't surprised to hear them gasp.

"Whoa..."

Rayla glanced at the humans and smiled as they looked at where she lived, with all of the buildings. It was very similar to the Moon Nexus in a way, a similar design, though not quite the same.

She turned around, "So, how's that elf impression going?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't want to write tinker. or elf callum. or elf claudia, which I feel will also inevitably come up. as if elf callum wasn't enough. 
> 
> there may be some procrastinating in writing the next few chapters since it's gonna be really difficult to figure out a personality for Tinker, which could and probably will be wrong. also, I am just going to call him Tinker.


	13. tinker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla goes home.

"So how's that elf impression going?" Rayla asked, as she turned around to look at Callum and Claudia. Callum pulled out what was previously Human Rayla's disguise.

"Well, my elf impersonation is flawless, so great." Callum said, "Hows yours, Claudia?"

"It's a work in progress." Claudia smiled, "But I think I'm getting the hang of it."

"So we're all set." Rayla glanced over to where they were headed, at the various tall buildings and smiled.

"Pretty much." Callum looked at the disguise,"So how are we going to sneak Claudia in there with us? I mean, we only have this..."

Rayla thought about it for a moment, and then took off her jacket which she then tossed at Claudia, "See if that works."

Claudia put on the coat and she pulled the hood over her head to hide the fact she was not an elf.

"Great. I barely even recognize you." Callum joked at Claudia as he put on what was currently his Elf Callum disguise, "So, Rayla, are you ready to meet Elf Callum and Elf Claudia?"

"Sure." Rayla replied, though actually unprepared. Callum turned around, and then turned towards Rayla.

"Hey, elf pals." Callum did a bad accent, which naturally caused Rayla to put her hands on her face, "Tell me, if you-"

"How are you doing that?" Claudia asked, pointing at his hands. It looked like he only had four fingers...

Callum turned his hand around, which revealed he seemed to be hiding his pinky in his glove, somehow, being the only human who could possibly do that. Claudia looked at her own hands in confusion.

"So, first things first..." Rayla said, "Let's get rid of the first part. And maybe the second part."

"But I never got to finish."

"And the voice you were doing." Rayla added, "And you don't actually have to talk to anyone."

"Hey, you barely even met Elf Callum. Give him a chance." Callum argued, and then went back to the accent, "I'm made out of magic and sarcasm. Mostly the latter. And I am not very fond of being lied to when I'm assassinating people."

Rayla stared at Callum, and then glanced over to Claudia.

Claudia then started her own elf impression, with a similarly bad accent, "I like... Uh... To do handstands! Regularly, of course. For fun."

Zym looked up at Claudia and Callum, confused at whatever it was they were doing.

"That's... A little better." Rayla remembered a previous conversation with Claudia she had quite awhile ago, "But you should probably work on your elf voice."

Callum sighed, shaking his head.

"Yeah, I thought it'd come out better than it did..." Claudia replied. She didn't have a lot of time to practice her elf impression, she barely even knew Rayla and one of the few things she knew about Rayla was she liked to do handstands.

Claudia looked back at her hands, thinking about a way to make it appear like she had four fingers. She didn't have quite what she needed... And Rayla and Callum both seemed to have something against her magic, anyway.

"Do you think anyone would notice if I just kept my hands behind my back?" Claudia asked.

"They shouldn't, since we're sneaking in."

"But just in case, we won't shake hands with anyone." Callum suggested, "So, are we all ready?"

* * *

Rayla quietly hid them behind some buildings as they entered, and they continued walking wherever there was the least elves, though some looked at them. They didn't seem interested, mostly doing what they were doing.

Claudia and Callum walked behind her, following as she attempted to make her way home without being seen, when she could probably walk right up to it without being noticed.

"So, where are we going?" Callum whispered.

"You'll see, just..." Rayla put her finger over her mouth, and continued leading them to a specific house. She lead them to the door and knocked, hesitantly. Callum and Claudia stood away from the door, not really wanting to be caught.

About a minute later, another elf answered the door, who was quite tall and looked a little relieved, "Rayla?"

"Hi." She said, a little bit more nervously than she wanted to. Callum and Claudia watched to see if he'd attack them, but he seemed more focused on Rayla, who he hugged. They were both pretty surprised to see this.

He didn't seem to notice them yet, though, talking to Rayla, "I'm glad you're okay."

"Yeah." Rayla awkwardly replied, glancing behind her at the humans, "Also, there's something I want to show you."

He also looked at them, probably at least a little confused. They walked closer to the door, Callum holding Zym. Claudia, still hesitant in case someone noticed they were human or at least extremely suspicious, was prepared to attack if necessary.

"The dragon prince." Rayla explained, quietly, "The egg wasn't destroyed, it was stolen."

"Oh, I see." The elf said, and noticed Claudia's hands, "Long story?"

"Yep."

The elf smiled, "Why don't you all come in?"

They walked into the house, which was also very nice. Callum turned to Rayla after the elf was far enough away and he whispered, "Who's this?"

"Tinker." Rayla whispered back, "He's... a friend of mine."

"Is he going to kill to us?" Claudia whispered.

"He's not an assassin, don't worry." Rayla answered, and smiled at Tinker who glanced in their direction, "He made my swords."

"Wait, he made those?"

* * *

After they were all settled in a little bit, Tinker, who seemed to be some sort of weird... responsible adult? who seemed to want them to eat real food? What is this? Probably worms, in Callum's experience.

"Is this secretly worms?" Callum asked immediately, staring at it suspicously.

Tinker looked at him kind of confused and at least a little alarmed, like he would never feed any unsuspecting visitor insects and didn't think that was even a thing that happened, "Worms?"

"Long story."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyways here's Tinker. I still have no idea how to write him since we know basically nothing about him. but he looks kinda just like a nice guy. since we don't know what kind of elf he is, I'm trying not to write him as anything specifically. 
> 
> but since he did make that thing for runaan, which used moon magic, I am going to be assuming he can make things that do moon magic.


	14. currency

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tinker helps them make a plan.

Tinker listened to their explanation, though it was a long one. They told him about how they all met, how Callum lied to Rayla and how she immediately changed her mind after Ezran showed her egg.

They told him about Claudia attacking them with her primal stone originally, and Callum stopping her and taking it. That the other elves didn't share the same opinion as Rayla and the whole ice situation, and why they were taking the egg back.

He seemed to be a lot more understanding about the situation than others had, even more so than Soren and Claudia, even with Claudia changing her mind about it.

"So, uh, after we take Zym back, maybe... Things will get better." Callum finished explaining, "We still have a long way to go, but soon Zym will be home."

"I see." Tinker said, "I can't imagine it's going to be easy to sneak around, though, as humans."

"Yeah..." Callum looked down, "At least I can do primal magic again, though."

Tinker did look a little bit confused at that comment, since there were a few things they forgot to explain, like Callum being able to do primal magic.

"Oh, I made my own connection so I can do sky primal magic." He was still leaving out a lot, but they really didn't have a lot of time to stay surrounded by elves, "It's a long story."

"I see." Tinker turned to look at Rayla and smiled, before suggesting, "Why don't you all stay here for a little while?"

"Isn't this place full of elves?"

"They don't have to see you." Tinker replied, "But perhaps it would be safer if you left with an illusion instead of a disguise."

Rayla was a little surprised he offered, though she knew what he meant. It was part of the reason she stopped by, but she expected that she'd be asking him. And maybe attempting to convince him.

"An illusion?"

"Yes." Tinker explained, "Specifically, one that would make you look like elves."

"Oh." Claudia turned to Callum, "So we wouldn't have to wear disguises anymore. Though, we should still work on our elf impressions."

"Elf impressions?" Tinker asked, though it wasn't really a question, "You should ask Rayla about that. She's great at impressions."

"Oh yeah, like Human Rayla." Claudia laughed. Tinker smiled, like he also knew Human Rayla, which made them question how many times Rayla had done Human Rayla and just how long Tinker had known her. Callum didn't even understand why Human Rayla was so popular...

"Huh, I'm surprised you're not trying to talk us out of it." Callum commented, "I mean, even Soren kind of tried at some point."

"For some reason, I doubt that would work." Tinker said, like he knew them and Rayla and he knew it wouldn't be that easy, "You're all in this together now, but there's no reason you shouldn't be safe, or at least safer."

"Huh." Callum replied, "You know, it's nice to actually meet someone who doesn't try and convince us to stop. And an elf that doesn't seem to hate humans."

Rayla looked at Callum in a sort of 'I told you' way and then smiled at Tinker.

"Yeah. A surprising amount of elves don't seem to hate humans." Claudia added.

"A surprising amount?" Callum asked, "We've met two."

"Which is already more than expected." She smiled, "Especially since one of them was an assassin we thought kidnapped you and Ezran."

"Though now you know that she didn't."

Claudia looked into the distance, and then asked out of curiosity, "Do you think Ezran and Soren have had the chance to explain it yet to everyone else yet?"

"Maybe.' Callum sighed, "Anyway, it's nice to meet you, elf who hasn't tried to kill us yet."

"Have a lot of elves tried to kill you?" Tinker questioned, a little bit alarmed. Tinker was strange, because he looked like he might try to adopt them all at any second and start a children collection.

Though, maybe they were imagining it, because at this point it sort of just seemed strange to meet an adult that was actually responsible, since Lujanne fed them worms without their knowledge and Soren built a zip-line, and or Slidey-Sling Go-Fast Rope.

Amaya was responsible, though their interactions with her were very brief and some of them involved her trying to kill Rayla. But that was a long time ago, or at least felt like it was.

Corvus was also a responsible adult, and one they had more recently seen, but they very briefly saw him. Overall, it was strange, especially since there was an elf who wasn't trying to feed them worms like Lujanne was.

"Pretty much all of them at some point." Callum answered casually. Tinker didn't look pleased to hear this, "Anyway, so now that we've explained everything, how do you know Rayla?"

Tinker smiled, looking at Rayla kind of like he might have already adopted her, "That's also a long story. Perhaps for another time."

"Okay."

* * *

After awhile, Tinker thought they should all get some rest while they were here, and apparently would later start working on what he would be giving them for the journey.

He seemed to working on getting supplies for them, yet another responsible adult thing they didn't quite expect from him though at this point it probably shouldn't surprise them.

Tinker walked up to Rayla to talk to her, smiling, though somehow he looked a little sad, "I'm glad you're okay, Rayla. Since..."

He trailed off, and briefly held onto his necklace. Rayla didn't seem to understand what he was referring to, "Since what?"

Tinker seemed to realize, and stopped smiling which meant he mostly just looked sad. He turned around, "Perhaps we should talk."

* * *

And then Tinker told her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh boy. anyway, here's some more tinker.


	15. so far away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia and Callum attempt to help Rayla.

Rayla didn't seem to want to talk to anyone. It was so strange, even though Rayla was usually distant with Claudia, she seemed further away than usual. She was even distant with Callum, and neither of them knew why.

Tinker didn't have a lot of time to explain, between working on the disguises and checking in on Rayla, which they similarly did, and they only really found out during the brief time Tinker didn't seem to be busy.

"Runaan?" Callum asked, and then tried to remember, "Wait, was that the elf that tried to kill us?"

"I'm sure he was one of them." Tinker said, "He was an assassin, after all."

"Well, uh, he had this bow, I think." Callum attempted to describe him, "And he wasn't really up to joining us, even after we showed him the egg."

"Stubborn..." Tinker quietly commented, before finishing explaining about Runaan, who was apparently Tinker's fiancé, and in the process the story of how he had known Rayla.

"Wow, you and Rayla have been friends for a long time." Callum realized, since Tinker had basically known Rayla for most of her life, which was a lot longer than they had known Rayla.

Aside from that, it seemed Rayla had also known Runaan for a long time... Callum didn't know a lot about him, but it seemed he might have been closer to Rayla than he had realized at the time.

Though, he really didn't realize a lot at the time other than there were elves who were trying to kill his brother, the egg wasn't destroyed and was actually stolen by his close friend's dad. It was actually a lot to process.

"So that's why we haven't seen Rayla?" Claudia asked.

Tinker nodded in response, and looked out the window to where Rayla was sitting in a tree, "She's uh, the only one that returned from the mission. I thought she might... have gotten capture or something."

Claudia felt a little bad, though she didn't want to, seeing how Tinker and Rayla were. She couldn't help but feel she might know exactly which elf they were referring to, the one she suggested they captured.

But that elf was the reason... Honestly, Claudia didn't know how to feel about it, but she did know how Rayla felt about it. Probably similar to how Callum and Ezran felt when they found out...

Callum, like Tinker, looked out the window at Rayla, pointlessly. He sighed, frustrated. Rayla didn't move from the tree, still. Claudia noticed how Rayla looked out the window and grabbed her elf disguise, "Callum, stay here."

"What? Why? Claudia, what are you doing?" Callum asked.

"Going to go talk to her." She told him, casually, "Maybe try and get her to come inside."

Callum picked up his own elf disguise, which Claudia wasn't really sure about, "Callum, it's dangerous."

"I know." Callum replied, putting it on.

Callum and Claudia climbed the tree Rayla was sitting in. They weren't sure if she knew they were there, because she didn't immediately say anything until eventually, "You shouldn't be out here."

"Technically." Callum said, "But, uh... Here we are."

Rayla didn't say a lot. It was a strange situation, after all, with Runaan and Callum's dad and all that. It seemed to be a little bit awkward, in that regard. Claudia didn't bring up that she had probably met Runaan. It was probably better she didn't.

"You should go back inside."

"You know, maybe you should come inside." Claudia suggested to Rayla, "You've been out here all day."

"No."

As the time passed, it seemed they were unable to convince her to come inside. Since she didn't really want to talk, they relunctantly went inside. Tinker was working on the disguises, which they assumed required a lot of focus.

Callum sighed, taking his elf disguise off and sitting down and Claudia did similarly, "She's not gonna come in, is she?"

"I don't think so." She replied, "Not anytime soon, anyway..."

Later during the night, Claudia tried again. She didn't think it was a good idea, but she wanted to. Rayla was really upset, and she might not be Rayla's friend and Rayla might not even trust her, but she still wanted to.

So she climbed the tree, "Hey."

"Hey." Rayla said, which was a little surprising. It wasn't like she was super enthusastic to see Claudia, but when she thought about it, this was really the first time Rayla had said 'hey' back to her, at least since Claudia betrayed them.

Every other time she had talked to Rayla, she seemed to mostly ask what she was up to and stuff similar to that, but right now...

"Maybe if I hadn't..." Rayla wasn't talking very loudly, and it looked like she was crying, at least a little. She didn't finish her sentence, and Claudia didn't know what to say. She didn't know Rayla very well.

"You don't know what I'm talking about, do you?"

"I don't know." She answered, honestly, "Tinker told us both a little bit, but..."

"But he doesn't know." Rayla turned her head towards Claudia, "He doesn't know that I failed or that I... I just couldn't."

She still wasn't sure what Rayla was referring to, but she nodded like she did. She sat in the tree with Rayla for a few hours, and eventually she started understanding at least a bit more, or at least she thought she did.

"So, um..." Claudia asked, "How do you know that...?"

"Moon magic..." Rayla replied, "There's this sort of... Well. We put these flowers in it that are connected to us, you know, when we send teams of assassins on missions..."

"Oh." Claudia then added quietly, "That's kind of cool."

It probably wasn't the time to comment on that, but she did, anyway.

"Yeah, it is..." Rayla said, "Usuully. But the others... They all..."

After a few minutes, she did start actually explaining what she had been talking about beforehand. Her mission, that guard that Claudia suspected liked Soren and all that. Rayla sighed, after she finished explaining it and put her arms on her knees.

Claudia took Rayla's hand, which seemed to somewhat surprise the elf though she didn't immediately pull her hand out of Claudia's, "Come on."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I read a lot of theories on the flowers and stuff... and I'm assuming it's something like this, at least, though I still have no idea.


	16. disguises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tinker gives them their disguises.

Rayla stared out the window. It was the first time she had really come inside after Tinker had told her. Claudia was sitting next to her, still, and she wasn't sure were Callum and Tinker were.

She didn't really want to talk to either of them about this. Well, mostly she didn't want to tell Tinker about the guard or how she was the reason his fiancé was probably captured in the first place.

And talking about it to Callum just didn't seem like it'd go well, since Runaan was an assassin and was probably even the one that, well... And even if he wasn't, one of the others probably was...

Strangely enough, that kinda made Claudia the best option. She never really thought Claudia would be the best option.

But here they were, inside. Just Rayla and the girl she didn't trust. And everything was just so... strange. Or something along the lines of that.

It really made her want to talk to Tinker, and that was frustrating.

* * *

A few days passed since they had arrived, though it didn't seem like they would be leaving anytime soon.

Tinker was almost done with the disguises, apparently. He had already finished the actual thing they would wear and was mostly working on what the disguises would look like.

Callum said it reminded him of what Lujanne had done for that wolf, which required some explaining since Claudia hadn't actually seen that.

Rayla was still pretty distant, though she occasionally talked to Claudia. Claudia was pretty sure Rayla wanted to be talking to Tinker more than she was, and sometimes she attempted to convince her to.

She started talking to Callum, too, though it was just a little bit at first. Callum seemed to understand, eveni f the situation was pretty weird for all of them. He started to help Claudia convince Rayla to talk to Tinker, even if they didn't really succeed.

Eventually, though, Rayla did tell them why she didn't want to.

"I messed up." Rayla said, "If I hadn't let that human go, they wouldn't have known we were coming."

"Isn't it a good thing?" Claudia asked, "I mean, you did find Zym."

Claudia didn't know if that would have happened if Rayla hadn't, judging by the explanations Rayla had given her about the mission and her failing and all that.

"To a human." Rayla answered, "But Runaan was his fiancé, obviously he'd be more important to him than a human he never met. And because of me, because I let that human go-"

"No." Callum cut her off, "You gave him a chance, Rayla. We showed him the egg, but he was the one who chose not to call it off. He could've come with us if he wanted to, but he chose not to."

"But I don't think Tinker's going to see it that way. He  _loved_  Runaan. He didn't love that human."

That wasn't even including the other assassins, who also didn't love that human. Definitely didn't, actually. They were pretty mad at Rayla about it...

"Yeah, well, he might not love that  _human_ , but he probably loves  _you._ " Callum argued, "And he would probably want you to talk to him."

" _Before_  you leave." Claudia added.

* * *

As the time passed, Rayla did start talking to Tinker more, though it wasn't about Runaan or anything. She wasn't quite that far yet, or perhaps that close.

Tinker had finished with their disguises, but he also wanted to give them a few 'just in case' items, other than all the supplies he had already given them, like real food.

"Here." He said to Rayla, as he handed her a knife, "Just in case."

"Thanks." She replied quietly, looking at the knife and attempting to decide where to put it. This knife would probably be great for if she lost her swords, or couldn't get to them. Tinker then turned to Callum.

"You do primal magic, right?" He asked, though he already knew that Callum did.

"Yeah... Why?"

Tinker handed Callum a book, "Perhaps you should look at some of these, then."

It seemed to be some kind of book about primal magic, probably one with some primal magic spells for Callum to learn.

Claudia expected some sort of comment from Rayla, especially something along the lines of 'great, now we don't need claudia', but she didn't say anything. Callum opened the book in curiosity.

"Wow, uh, thanks." Callum read a few words in the book and turned a few of the pages, seeing many different spells.

Tinker also handed Claudia some kind of strange... thingy. She wasn't sure what it was. She turned it around, and jumped a little because it seemed to create shadows. Claudia looked at him, confused.

Tinker shrugged, "If you need to distract anyone."

_This would be great for pranking Soren_ , Claudia thought almost immediately, as about a hundred different ways to use it suddenly occurred to her, "Thanks."

"And here are your disguises." Tinker handed them the disguises, which they put on, "As long as you're wearing those, you should look like an elf."

Claudia turned towards Callum and gasped. He blinked at her as well, surprised at how she looked. Which was like an elf. Similarly, Callum looked like an elf. It was strange seeing someone she had known so long look so different.

"Well, uh, great. Now we just have to work on our impressions. Let's go do that, right Claudia?" Callum said, though it wasn't subtle what he was trying to do.

"Right. Let's go over there." Claudia pointed to an area away from Rayla and Tinker, "And practice our elf impressions so that no one thinks these are disguises."

They walked away, still very unsubtle. Rayla sighed and Tinker looked at them, confused. It was inevitable, but she really didn't want to do it, at least not yet.

"Tinker?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know, I think season 2 confirmed that rayla is the only one that returned from the mission and somehow, I don't think she's going to be taking any of this well.


	17. old friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla, Callum and Claudia run into someone.

So Rayla talked to him, this time even about the things she didn't really want to, and maybe in the process ended up crying a little. But Tinker was understanding, and he didn't think it was her fault even if she did, even if she did mess up on her mission.

But he didn't really see it that way, he didn't really seem to consider it as her messing up. He thought that what she was doing was great.

"Runaan knew what he was doing, Rayla." He told her, "They all did. But you made the right choice. Returning the dragon prince could change things."

He hugged Rayla. She quietly said, "I should probably do that, then..."

"Perhaps."

* * *

Rayla attempted to focus on returning Zym to his mom, and they left. She hugged Tinker again before leaving, alongside Callum, Claudia and Zym.

This time, they actually walked through the town insteading of sneaking out. They didn't have to with these disguises, since they actually looked like elves.

Callum and Claudia tried not to look amazed at the architecture, or any of the magical creatures that were around. Or any other magic, since Callum realized Rayla was right when she said it was pretty much everywhere.

It was kinda difficult, but no one seemed to notice them, anyway. Or maybe they just didn't care, like that one elf. It was hard to tell.

It wasn't long before they were out of the town, even if they weren't that far from it. Rayla looked at a map, which was in the supplies they had been given.

"Okay, so..." Rayla looked at the map, and then continued walking in the same direction.

"Hey, can I see that?" Callum asked, out of curiosity.

"Sure." Rayla turned around and gave it to him, and returned to walking. Callum looked at it while they walked, Claudia beside him as she usually was.

Claudia waited in anticipation while they walked, expecting that at some point Rayla would realize they didn't need Claudia to teach Callum magic. But as they grew further and further away from the town, it started to seem like maybe Rayla wasn't going to.

Maybe she had forgot or something, because it probably wasn't that Rayla trusted her. Rayla was very clear that she didn't, and yeah, they did recently have a few conversations where Rayla didn't bring up Claudia betraying them, but that probably didn't mean a lot, if anything.

Maybe Rayla just wasn't there yet, or she hadn't realize they don't need Claudia.

She wasn't sure, and she wasn't sure if Rayla would ever actually trust her. But she didn't look like she thought Claudia was going to take Zym or attack Callum, or at least as much as she usually did. And maybe that was a step.

They noticed some elves up ahead, and hesitantly walked past them. They did seem to notice them, but they it was different. They didn't know they were human, so they didn't attack them. It was a good thing.

"A human?" They heard one of the elves say, which made it seem like maybe their disguise fell off, or their elf impression was just that bad they didn't even have to do it. They turned around, but the elves weren't focused on them.

They were focused on the human sitting on a giant, dangerous creature, so they all immediately ran towards the elves.

"Rayla!" Ezran said, getting off of his new friend, "There you guys are. I looked everywhere."

One of the elves looked at Rayla, Callum and Claudia confused, "Wait, so you guys know this human? Why?"

Ezran pet the animal, and walked over to them with the animal. The elves did seem a little alarmed, maybe even confused. It probably wasn't a common occurrence for them to see human children riding on giant, magical creatures.

They might have attacked him if his new animal friend wasn't giving them that look. Ezran pet the animal again, "Thank you."

The animal ran off, and they immediately hid Ezran behind them. Zym was very excited to see him, immediately jumping into his arms. Callum prepared to use a spell, if necessary. But the elves didn't seem to care, so they hesitantly ran away from them.

"Ez, what are you doing here?" Callum asked, taking his disguise off once they were a reasonable distance away, "I thought you were going home."

"I did, but... Things aren't really great right now, Callum." Ezran replied, "When we got back, Viren was acting kinda weird. Everyone was."

"Weird... how?" Callum questioned, hesitantly.

"Just weird. And then he tried to attack me-"

"He tried to attack you?" Callum didn't intend to shout it, but he did. Callum and Rayla looked at Claudia, a little bit confused and suspicious.

"That doesn't make any sense..." Claudia said, "Why would my dad attack you?"

"I don't know, but something was weird about him. And then there was fighting and he did something weird and Gren and Corvus both told me I needed to go here until things clear up." Ezran explained, "Something's really wrong, Callum."

It wasn't really making any sense. Soren had told her... It wasn't really making any sense. Why would he attack Ezran? Claudia didn't really like this.

Bait added in his opinion, "Even Bait thinks there's something going on."

"But what is going on?" Callum asked, "I mean, we know something's up with Viren but we don't know what. I mean, clearly something's been up with him for awhile."

"Whatever it is, it sounds dangerous." Rayla commented.

Ezran pet Zym, who was still really excited to see him. It made sense, with how long it was since Zym had seen him, "He started talking to... a mirror?"

Ezran sounded confused about it, but Claudia wasn't, "A mirror?"

Claudia wasn't sure about it, but she was starting to think that maybe he had learned whatever it was that... Maybe he had learned something about it. But it didn't sound like a good thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't think Ezran is just going to leave the group, and I also don't think Viren is just gonna... stay there. 
> 
> anyway, here's Ezran. I also wanted to give callum the map, probably because of his voice.


	18. somewhere

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla, Callum, Claudia and Ezran continue their journey.

Rayla sat outside, probably deep in thought. Callum and Ezran were still talking, mostly about the things that had recently happened. Claudia still wasn't sure what to think about it, but it was a good opportunity to talk to Rayla, or at least try.

That's what Callum and Ezran had originally wanted her to do, and even if Rayla was still far from trusting her and she didn't know Rayla that well, at a certain point she almost actually wanted to, at least to see if anything changed.

So she walked up to Rayla, sitting next to her. She probably should have put her disguise back on, but it wasn't like there was anyone around.

"Hey." She said, smiling at Rayla.

Rayla glanced at her, and replied, "Hey... Shouldn't you be wearing your disguise?"

Claudia shrugged, "There isn't really anyone around right now."

"There could be." Rayla suggested, "But I guess it  _should_  be okay."

She wasn't quite sure, but it seemed like this was maybe a start, like maybe there were small steps they could take to get  _somewhere._  Even if somewhere wasn't necessarily friendship.

Claudia glanced at Rayla, and then changed the topic, "So..."

Rayla turned her head towards her, which was a great opportunity for Claudia to gently take some strands of her hair in her hand, "How come you don't have a braid anymore?"

"A braid?" Rayla questioned, and Claudia almost immediately added on to her previous sentence, elaborating.

"I mean, I know you lost your other one." She mentioned, "But how come you don't have a new one yet?"

"There wasn't really a good time."

"Hmm." Claudia then asked, "So, could I braid your hair then?"

"What?" Rayla seemed kinda confused by that question, "Why would you want to do that?"

"I mean, the other braid was so cute." Claudia said, and shrugged, "And I thought it might be fun."

Hesitantly, Rayla replied, "Okay."

Claudia smiled, and started braiding some of Rayla's hair into a small braid which, like her first one, could go behind her ear.

"There." Claudia finished the braid. It was also a cute braid, much like the previous one. Rayla held the braid, probably still a little bit confused that Claudia, who was previously her enemy, had braided her hair, "Another cute braid."

"Thanks..." Rayla let go of the braid, and Claudia returned to where she was previously sitting beside her.

* * *

They set off a while later, though this time Claudia was walking next to Ezran and Callum. Ezran had Zym in his bag, which Zym didn't really appreciate but they thought it might draw less attention to them.

"So, did you have a chance to hear Soren's poetry?" Claudia asked Ezran, smiling.

"Yeah." Ezran nodded, "He even showed us his newer ones."

"Soren writes poetry?" Callum questioned.

Claudia and Ezran nodded, "He started recently."

"Huh." Callum said, and then looked at Rayla, "Hey, Rayla, shouldn't we be going this way?"

She stopped walking, "Why would we do that? The safest way is this way."

"Well, according to the map, if we go past these... rocky things and what I think might be a river, then we should be here..." Callum put his finger on the place he was talking about, and moved it towards where Zym's mom was, "A lot faster."

"We can't go there." Rayla replied, looking at the map, "It seems quicker, but it's too dangerous."

"What's so dangerous about some rocks?" Callum asked.

"It's not that simple." She turned around to walk away, "The rocks just aren't sturdy enough and we're more likely to run into someone."

Callum sighed, "I'm sure we'd be able to figure something out, the only difference is that we could be there a day earlier, and the sooner we return Zym the better, right? Come on, Rayla."

Rayla sighed as well, "It's more important that we keep Zym safe. But if you really think that we could get across safely, then fine."

"Great." Callum put away the map and looked in the primal magic book, "Because I think I saw something that could help us."

* * *

"Okay. So this is a little more difficult than I thought it'd be." Callum commented, shortly after arriving at the 'rocky things'. The rocks looked a lot different in person, "But I think we can manage it."

Callum hesitantly started walking towards a pathway, the others following him. This time, they were actually being quiet, since they didn't really feel up to rocks falling on all of them. But surprisingly, they got past the first few rocks without any interruption.

"You know, I wasn't sure about this when we got here." Callum said, "But it looks like we're almost across the rock part."

"Callum?" Claudia whispered. He turned his head to look at her, but noticed that Claudia wasn't even looking at him. Unfortunately, she was more focused on the dragon.

"Oh."

The dragon was flying around them, and they started to realize they forgot to put their disguises back on... Callum looked through the book for something that might be helpful, flipping through the pages really quickly.

What he originally thought would be helpful mostly applied to the rock parts, but he honestly never expected to see a dragon here. Which, he probably should've since there were a lot of dragons here, but it just didn't seem like there would be any.

"I can't find anything..." Callum realized, "There's nothing in here that looks like it'd really help. Maybe if..."

Callum glanced at his surroundings, looking for a way to use the spells. But before he could come up with a strategy, the dragon started to attack.

They just barely moved out of the way in time, but the dragon ended up hitting rocks instead, blocking off the previous pathway, which meant they couldn't really go back.

Callum went to check on Ezran, almost immediately, "Ez? You okay?"

"Bait!" Ezran picked up the glow toad, making sure he was alright. Zym looked out from inside of Ezran's bag, which he then picked up.

"I told you!" Rayla commented, looking at Callum.

"We need to slow it down or something, just long enough for us to get out of here." Callum said, ignoring her comment, "Maybe if I use the ice spell, we could stall it."

"Or maybe you could make it fall asleep or something." Rayla suggested sarcastically. Claudia gasped, and tapped her nose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the whole claudia braiding rayla's hair thing was pretty popular, right? maybe it's too early for that, but I already wrote it, so anyways.
> 
> thought we needed something other than descriptions of them walking and getting distracted, and also starting on something I've been thinking about for awhile soon.


	19. terrible ideas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They continue the inconvenient shortcut.

Claudia quickly pulled out the object she had recently used to attempt and make Rayla fall asleep, though it wasn't really that recent. She was glad she brought it along anyway, though, because maybe they could make the dragon fall asleep.

She hadn't ever really used it on a dragon before, since there weren't really a lot of situations in which she faced dragons and happened to have it with her.

"Claudia, whatever you're thinking, you probably shouldn't do it." Callum suggested, though she ignored him.

"Just cover your ears." She said. Callum still didn't seem to understand, but Rayla did. She covered her ears, and apparently by seeing Rayla do it, Callum and Ezran started to as well. So Claudia started playing it, waiting for the dragon to start to fall asleep.

It didn't seem to do anything at first, except make the dragon angry. But the dragon did start moving slightly different, so Claudia glanced at her friends to make sure they were running. Except they weren't  _running_ , but they  _were_  walking.

Probably in an attempt not to fall asleep, but it probably would've been more convenient. Claudia stopped playing, and gestured to her friends, "Go!"

The dragon seemed distracted by her, at the least. It was flying directly at her. Claudia managed to dodge, though only just. She tried to move quickly, since the dragon running into the cliff instead of her was making the rocks fall.

Callum turned towards Rayla, "Rayla, take Ez and run."

"What are you doing?" She asked, watching as he turned back towards Claudia, who was surprisingly good at dodging rocks.

"I need to go help Claudia." Callum answered, "Just take Zym and Ezran out of here."

"Callum, it's too dangerous. It's safer if you take Ezran and Zym." Rayla argued, "I'll go get Claudia."

"She's my friend and she's only in danger because of my idea. I'm going a-" Callum attempted to reply, but was cut off by Rayla, who was walking past him.

 _She's my friend too_. A part of her wanted to say, though she didn't, because Claudia wasn't her friend. Not yet, anyway, but maybe she could be.

Rayla turned around briefly, "We're in this together."

She ran off towards Claudia, who was still distracting the dragon. She was faster than Callum, anyway, so she got there faster than he would've.

She didn't really have a plan, unfortunately. The dragon was flying around again, probably prepared to attack Claudia again.

Rayla grabbed Claudia's hand, "Come on."

"Got anymore ideas?" Claudia asked while Rayla was moving them a bit further down the pathway, though the dragon had a strategy of its own. Instead of attempting to run into them, it ran into the pathway up ahead, blocking them off from the others.

"Not really." Rayla said, watching as the dragon stared at them, and roared. She looked at Claudia and quickly added to her previous sentence, "Maybe if there was a way we could get it to move away out of the way, or if we could slow it down somehow..."

Claudia pulled out something strange, "I can slow it down."

"But that's-"

"Unless you have any ideas." Claudia stared at her, and Rayla sighed, "Fine."

"But first, maybe if we go the other way it'll follow us." Claudia suggested, "Then I'll slow it down and we'll find a way to get across."

"I have a way for that." Rayla commented, and started running with Claudia in the other direction, "So we want it to follow us?"

"Yep." Claudia was kind of smiling at this point. The dragon did start following them, as intended, though it started flying almost immediately faster than they could run, and landing in front of them.

Claudia used her magic to slow it down. Rayla didn't particularly like this part, but she still took Claudia's hand again and ran away, "Did it work?"

"It should've, but I guess we'll see." Claudia then glanced behind her. The dragon did seem to be going slow, though it wasn't as signifigantly as hoped. The dragon ran into the cliff, almost directly after they made it past that part.

"Will it wear off?"

"Eventually." Claudia replied, as they made it towards where the dragon had destroyed the pathway, "We probably shouldn't wait around for it to, though. So you have a plan for getting across?"

"Something like that." And then she took out one of her swords and jumped, still holding onto Claudia. She just barely managed to grab onto some of the cliff when they were falling, but it was difficult doing this with Claudia.

She looked down at Claudia, "This was a bad idea. A bad, impractical idea."

"Impractical is just another kind of practical." Claudia smiled, remembering a similar previous quote.

Rayla laughed a little bit, though it was still a bad time. Humans were so strange sometimes. It was convenient the dragon seemed to be confused enough about its speed that it wasn't attacking currently, though it'd probably figure it out soon enough.

She attempted to pull Claudia up a little bit more, and took her sword out and jumped towards the rest of the cliff. Honestly, they probably wouldn't have made it, except that was the moment the dragon attacked.

Usually, that would have been inconvenient, but the dragon had missed and attacked almost directly underneath them, which meant they fell on the dragon. Though it was difficult balancing on the dragon, the dragon was pretty close to the cliff.

Rayla and Claudia jumped, though with difficulty from being on a dragon, and grabbed onto the edge of the cliff, just barely.

Claudia set down the object she had recently gotten from Tinker, which made it appear like there were shadows, though quickly afterwards running away before the dragon could realize they were there.

Walking down the rest of the pathway was a lot easier without being attacked by a dragon, though they didn't see Callum and Ezran anywhere, which probably meant they had already made it across.

* * *

"You shouldn't have used your magic." Rayla eventually said, walking down the pathway. She didn't really want to ruin the moment, since they were sort of getting along.

Claudia shrugged, "It's not like there was anything else I could do."

"You rely on it too much." Rayla pointed out, "Have you ever considered trying to learn Primal Magic, like Callum did?"

She wasn't sure which primal source would be the best for Claudia, honestly. Maybe Callum could teach her sky magic. She was kind of like a storm in a way, after all.

"We've talked about it." Claudia replied. Back when she had originally started travelling with them to teach Callum magic, she remembered they talked about it a few times, though not really in a serious way, "But Callum is special. We don't even know if just any human could do it. "

"You could at least try." Rayla suggested, "You can't really use that here."

"You know, maybe I'll ask Callum about that later." Claudia smiled, though it was partially to avoid fighting with Rayla. But maybe she would, because it would be cool to be able to use primal magic, too. And they'd be less likely to get caught.

"In the meantime..." Claudia took Rayla's hand, and even if she was angry she didn't immediately take it away, "We should go find them."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah, finally. we're getting somewhere.
> 
> that one claudia line is also pretty popular. they might even reference it later on.


	20. beginnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla and Claudia talk about things they maybe should've talked about 10 chapters ago.

It was strange, really, since originally she had been so angry at Claudia. When they first met, and she was sure she was up to something... It was disappointing when she was right.

But now, they were walking together. And Claudia wasn't behind her like she usually was, and sometimes she'd just smile at her for some reason.

Rayla was probably nervous about the dragon they had recently escaped, she figured, since she did feel a little bit nervous. Though she decided to ignore it, she continued walking cautiously.

They stopped, stepping onto the grass and sighing in relief as there wouldn't be as many rocks falling on them.

"Rayla, Claudia!" They heard their friends say, and they turned towards the direction of their friends and ran towards them. Ezran was holding Bait and Zym was attempting to play with Callum.

They looked relieved to see them, which made sense because the last time they saw them they were fighting a dragon.

"You made it!" Callum said, and he was holding a map, "So, uh, Rayla... You were right about this path."

"I know." She replied, "I told you this was a bad idea."

"Yeah... But, at least we should be able to get Zym home sooner. Though we might run into a few elves on the way, since it looks like some of them live about..." Callum pointed his finger at an elf town on the map, "Here, which is a little bit before returning Zym."

"Great." Rayla commented, sarcastically, "We should get going. We're still really close to that dragon."

She started walking ahead of them, though Claudia caught up after quickly putting on her disguise. Ezran put Zym in his bag, though the baby dragon didn't appreciate it.

They seemed to be doing a lot of walking lately, though Rayla had just done a lot of almost falling. And maybe, just a little bit of bonding.

Later on when they took a break from walking, Claudia was even hanging out with Rayla again. A while ago, it might have annoyed her when Claudia talked, or tried to talk to her, and she might have even reminded Claudia that she didn't trust her.

It wasn't like she trusted her now, but it was nice to actually talk to her, sometimes.

"It's nice to be away from cliffs." Claudia was talking relatively quietly, softly. She lied down in the grass, "I can't believe we managed to get away from that dragon. Maybe we're actually kind of a good team..."

Rayla adjusted her position, looking at Claudia who was smiling at her and for a few short moments it seemed she was staring into her eyes, and Claudia was staring into hers.

"Yeah," Rayla replied, and she smiled, "Maybe."

It was difficult not to trust Claudia, sometimes, and she wasn't sure if she shouldn't. Claudia could've betrayed them again, after all, but she didn't.

Or when Claudia told them to go, when she distracted the dragon so the dragon wouldn't be focused on them... But Claudia used...

Rayla looked away from Claudia, sitting in the way she previously was though moving away, just a little bit. Claudia seemed to notice.

She sat up, though Rayla didn't seem as talkative as she previously was. Even if Rayla wasn't pointing out the problem, she could probably guess from one of their recent conversations.

Rayla stood up, "I'm going to go, uh, look at the map."

Claudia watched her walk away, and sighed. She had a feeling that Rayla still had a problem with her magic. But she didn't understand why.

Rayla was looking at the map, though they probably wouldn't be travelling anymore today, as it was already starting to get late.

"Instead of going somewhere dangerous because it's faster, we should stick to this pathway." Claudia heard Rayla say, pointing at something on the map.

"Less dangerous pathways, sounds good." Callum agreed.

Later during the night, Claudia was deep in thought. Everything was starting to seem so... strange.

Claudia was sitting in the grass outside. She didn't think anyone else was awake, but she realized she was wrong when Rayla came and sat beside her.

"Hey." Rayla said, softly.

Claudia smiled, though she was still kind of confused.

"What are you doing out here?" Rayla asked.

Claudia shrugged, and yawned, "Thinking."

She didn't really say anything else, like what she was thinking about. But there were a lot of things she was thinking about... She didn't know what was up with her dad, for one, but it didn't sound good.

Rayla didn't really seem to have a reply for that, maybe because Claudia didn't seem like she wanted to elaborate. She mostly just nodded.

A few minutes passed without either of them saying anything, until eventually Rayla admitted, "I want to trust you."

Claudia turned towards Rayla at this and waited for her to continue.

"I wanted to trust you, and then you betrayed us. But I want to." She explained, and she might have been thinking about it a lot, because she did seem to have a lot to say about it, "But you still use..."

"My magic." Claudia finished for her, "I still use 'my kind of magic'."

"Yeah..."

Claudia turned away, looking at the stars, "But what's wrong with my magic? I mean, the way I think about it... Humans, we were born with norhing. But we still found a way to do all these things... Amazing things."

"You're..." Rayla sighed, thinking about how she was going to explain it, "You're using magical creatures to do magic. Creatures like Bait, or the dragon prince."

"And...?"

"And it's wrong. Maybe you weren't born with the ability to do magic, but that doesn't mean you have to use them for that. You can make your own connection!" Rayla argued, and her voice was starting to get louder.

"Why, because Callum could?" Her voice was starting to get louder, too, she noticed. Though it probably wasn't good, with how late it was, "We don't even know that anyone else could. But I use my magic for... everything. It's just who I am."

"It doesn't have to be. You don't have to."

"But I do. Callum's special, Rayla. It's not that simple. It's not like I can just make my own connection to a primal source. I mean, if only Callum has ever done that-"

"Maybe he's the only one that's ever tried." Rayla interrupted her, "You could do it, but if you're not even going to try to learn primal magic and stop using innocent, living creatures just to do magic, then fine."

She stood up, clearly not pleased. Rayla walked away, leaving her alone once again.


	21. primal magic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia and Callum practice magic.

Claudia still didn't understand, and for some reason she couldn't stop thinking about it. It didn't make any sense to her why she felt so... flustered. I mean, it shouldn't be bothering her this much.

It wasn't even the first time she and Rayla had that kind of conversation. It wasn't like she didn't know how Rayla felt about her magic, but she didn't really understand why.

She sighed, not very focused on the conversation she, Callum and Ezran were currently having, "Hey, Claudia?"

"Hmm?" She didn't move, still deep in thought about it. That conversation with Rayla was still bothering her, which was inconvenient because she should be focusing on returning Zym with them, though it wasn't like they were leaving right now.

"I just realized I've never really asked, but uh, how come your hair has that..." Callum kind of gestured to what he was referring to.

"Oh, that." Claudia said, "Well, after I healed Soren I guess it was just kind of a big spell. I haven't had time to get rid of it yet."

"Wait, so when you do a lot of magic, your hair turns white?"

"Just some of it." She shrugged, "Why?"

Callum and Ezran looked kind of uncomfortable at discovering this. But it wasn't like it was even that bad, I mean, had they ever seen her dad after using a particularly strong spell?

"Well, I mean... It kind of seems like maybe you shouldn't be doing it." Ezran suggested.

"Did Rayla tell you that?" Claudia questioned, and then sighed, "I don't know what's so with my magic. I mean, without it, I wouldn't have been able to heal Soren. We might not have even been able to find you."

"Claudia." Ezran walked over to her, holding Zym. He placed the baby dragon in her arms, "Maybe if you look at Zym, it'll help you understand."

"Yeah, I mean," Callum added, "Just try and think of all the things you could use him for while looking into his eyes."

Zym did have... very big eyes that were very cute. She didn't really want to admit that she couldn't do that, so she let him go, "I'm not supposed to hold Zym."

"Then I'll hold him." Ezran picked up the baby dragon, holding him out towards Claudia and eventually she just ended up taking him and cuddling him, since when there are baby animals that are very cute and they are in your face, it is very difficult not to cuddle them.

Ezran sighed, "You and Rayla were really getting along, but now you're fighting about this."

Claudia briefly stopped cuddling the baby dragon to reply, "Well, she's the one who has a problem with my magic."

"She does." Callum said, "But uh... Claudia, why don't I try and teach you some primal magic later? You know, tell you about making a connection to a primal source, or something. So you could also use primal magic."

"Shouldn't we be working on returning Zym?"

"We have some time. We could go work on it right now if you wanted."

She didn't really want to, exactly. Well, she wanted to learn primal magic, but it kind of just seemed like they were trying some sort of different way to make her understand how they felt about her magic, or something.

But she did want to learn primal magic eventually, and maybe if she started learning primal magic, she and Rayla would stop fighting. And she didn't really feel like fighting.

Claudia relunctantly gave Zym back to Ezran, "I guess we could do that. I mean, it would be pretty cool to be able to do primal magic, too."

* * *

"So, uh." Callum attempted to start explaining, "To do primal magic you need to understand an arcanum. When I understood the meaning of the sky arcanum, I was able to use magic again."

"So, how do I do that?" Claudia asked.

"I'm not sure exactly. I can try and explain the sky arcanum to you." Callum suggested, "It's like... Like the primal stone, except we're inside it."

Callum started rambling about things that probably would have made more sense if she had the context for some of it, but she really didn't. It was a very similar explanation to the first she had heard about why he could use primal magic again.

Although he explained, it didn't entirely make sense. It made some sense, but honestly if she was going to learn any primal source, would it even be the sky?

Maybe she'd understand a different one better, or maybe she'd understand none of them.

"Maybe the sky arcanum isn't really your thing..." Callum sighed, "I want to be able to explain the other ones, but this is the only one I know."

"Huh." Claudia said, "Maybe we can figure them out together. At least one of them."

"Yeah. Maybe..." Callum smiled, "I can tell you a little bit about what Lujanne told me about the moon arcanum, in the meantime, and then we could look into the meanings of the other primal sources."

She smiled, "Sounds good. Which one do you want to try and learn next?"

"I don't know. I haven't really decided on which one to learn next." Callum replied, "But I think all of them. But I mean, that's crazy, right?"

"No. You should learn all of them." Claudia agreed, enthusastically, "Like you could learn how to use the ocean magic, or maybe even star magic. You could learn all of it. Just imagine how much you could do."

Claudia was a little surprised she was getting so excited about this, since she knew Callum mostly just suggested it so she wouldn't have to use her magic, probably because she and Rayla were still fighting.

But it was starting to sound more and more interesting. Claudia did like learning magic, after all, even if she did prefer 'her kind of magic'.

"Probably a lot." Callum commented, "I'm just glad I can use sky magic again. But it would be pretty cool to learn other types of magic."

"Exactly."

Callum then changed the topic to the previous one, "So, the moon arcanum..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so uh, what would claudia's primal source be? because I'm not really sure about that yet.


	22. meanings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia and Callum talk.

"So, from what I've read about earth magic," Callum explained, "It sounds like it's power is just kind of from stones. So, uh, we can pick up these stones..."

Callum picked up a nearby rock, holding it up, "Maybe we'll be able to figure out the meaning of the earth arcanum."

"That makes sense." Claudia smiled, also picked up a rock. She held it up to her hands, in front of her eyes in an attempt to figure it out.

She thought about the rock, features it had and all that. But somehow, she just wasn't sure if this was really her thing. Claudia and Callum talked about their observations of the rock, but it seemed kind of... pointless.

After awhile, she still didn't feel like she understood earth magic anymore than she originally did, "So, what now?"

"I don't know." Callum said, looking through the book, "We've tried so many of these in here already but I'm not sure we've gotten any further."

"That's a shame." Claudia commented, "But at least I still have my magic, right?"

"Yeah, I guess..." Callum replied, "But Claudia, I've used it before and it was... It wasn't great. It was so different from primal magic... I'm not sure anyone should use it."

"Well, we don't really have anything else to use, do we?" Claudia place the rock down and leaned back, "I mean, maybe some people can use primal magic, Callum, but it doesn't seem to be a very common thing."

"Maybe they just didn't think to do it." Callum looked up from the book to look at Claudia, "I mean, maybe there's a lot more people who could that just never thought to do it. I wouldn't have if I hadn't talked to Lujanne, and elves and humans... It's not like we talk regularly."

"Huh. Well, maybe my source of magic just isn't primal magic." Claudia suggested, "I've always been good at magic. It's just not primal magic. It's something different, something that let us do amazing things without a primal source."

"So I take it you're probably not gonna want to give that up anytime soon, huh?"

"Why would I want to give that up?" Claudia asked, "I use magic for everything. Without it, we wouldn't have been able to find you. And then we wouldn't have known you weren't kidnapped. I wouldn't have been able to have healed Soren."

"I'd have to find a new way to make pancakes, or even Hot Brown Morning Potion, if there even is a way." Claudia continued, "I've used it for so long, giving it up now would just be... What else would I do?"

"I think I understand how you feel." Callum said, "When I broke your primal stone, it wasn't just that I couldn't do magic. I was good at magic, it was my thing, who I was."

"Then, it must have been hard to break it." Claudia commented, staring into the distance.

"I guess it kind of was. I wasn't really thinking about that at the time, we all just wanted Zym to be okay." Callum replied, "But after talking to Lujanne, I realized that maybe I wasn't born connected to an arcanum, but maybe I could still make my own connection."

"And you did." Claudia smiled.

"I did. I understood the sky arcanum, and it wasn't just one simple thing like I thought it was. It was everything." Callum put his book down and took out a different one, turning to the page where Rayla had drawn the primal sources, "I don't know if I'm making any sense right now, but my point is I understand. Maybe if we found the right primal source for you..."

"Callum." Claudia didn't let him continue his sentence, interrupting, "Do you really think I could do that?"

"I did, and I'm not any different from you."

"You're special, Callum." Claudia didn't even glance at him while she talked, just looking at the stars, "But even when I had a primal stone, it just wasn't like that. Primal magic isn't for everyone."

Callum looked at the ground and sighed, before he looked back up at Claudia, "But you're wrong. Maybe it isn't for everyone, maybe it is. But if anyone could do primal magic, It'd be you."

Claudia turned her head towards him, watching as he flipped through the pages of his primal magic book, "We haven't tried everything yet. Maybe while we're here, we'll run into an elf we can ask about their arcanum."

"We could also try asking the animals. I mean, they're magic too." Claudia suggested.

"I guess we could ask Ezran for help with that." Callum replied, and handed Claudia his primal magic book, "In the meantime, maybe reading this will help you with finding a primal source."

"Huh, maybe." Claudia smiled at Callum, "Thank you."

* * *

When they left the next morning, Claudia almost walked into several trees. Maybe she was a little bit too distracted by the book, maybe because of the conversation she had with Callum.

Maybe it had just been a long time since she read. Whatever it was, Rayla didn't seem to appreciate her being so distracted, which was clear even if she didn't really comment on it.

Probably because of how many occasions they all had to stop her from walking into something. But she was really focused on the book.

Eventually, she sighed and put the book away, even if she still didn't seem to be close to finding a primal source. But her friends thought she could do it.

So maybe she just had to work on it. Learning magic always took her some time, even if this was primal magic instead. Claudia didn't know if she learned primal magic, if it'd be the only thing she used. It probably wouldn't.

But if she could do it... Maybe she'd use it less, even if it was only a little bit.


	23. moon and stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia makes a decision.

Later during the night, Claudia pretended to be asleep until Callum, Ezran and Rayla were. She probably should've been sleeping, too, but she had other things on her mind.

Claudia got up, carefully leaving so she wouldn't wake them up. She didn't go that far from them, since she didn't particularly want to get separated, but she did go far enough to find a good place to read.

"Okay, book." Claudia said, sitting in the grass, "Tell me about primal sources."

"Well, there's the moon-"

Claudia almost screamed a little, turning around quickly to see Rayla, "Oh, Rayla. What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same question." Rayla replied, walking over towards her.

"Reading." Claudia answered, "I was going to read about primal sources, and I thought over here was a good place to do that."

"Shouldn't you be sleeping?" Rayla asked, sitting down. Claudia shrugged as a response, opening the book.

"You know, if you really want to know more about primal sources..." Rayla started, "Why don't you come with me?"

Rayla held her hand out to Claudia, so she took it. She and Rayla had been fighting a lot lately, even though they had just started getting along. But right now... It didn't seem like they were fighting.

And Claudia didn't want to fight.

* * *

Rayla took Claudia away from where she had attempted to read, towards where there seemed to be a cliff. It wasn't surrounded by a lot, and it was easy to see the sky.

"So, you're gonna tell me about primal sources?" Claudia asked.

"Something like that." Rayla smiled, "You know what all the primal sources are, right?"

"Yeah." She nodded. Rayla stood near the cliff, looking at the sky. Claudia followed her, though she wasn't sure what Rayla was doing.

Rayla turned towards Claudia, "The primal sources are the source of all magic here. And pretty much everything is magic. It's everywhere."

"I know." Claudia said. She almost mentioned how many possibilities there were, how many things she could do but thought it was probably best if she didn't. Especially not to Rayla.

"Almost everything that lives here has a primal source. And what you use them for..."

"I thought you wanted to tell me about primal magic?" Claudia interrupted. Rayla took Claudia's hands, holding them.

"I did. But first you need to understand why we find it wrong." Rayla explained, "It's not just a few spiders, Claudia. It's... everything. Just look."

Rayla let go of one of her hands to gesture, turning her head towards where there were some kind of magical birds or something, "You could use those birds, or Bait or  _me._ "

"You?" Claudia questioned.

It wasn't like she didn't know elves had a primal source or anything, or all the things they could be used for. But she never really actually met an elf before now, not one she had a conversation with, anyway. And...

_I want to trust you._

Not one that was her friend.

Claudia looked into Rayla's eyes, and Rayla took her other hand again, "Even elves could be..."

"Yeah." Claudia replied, quietly, "I know, but isn't it... different? I mean, if it's not elves?"

"Not really." Rayla said, "We're not any different from everything else you use. We have a primal source, like them."

"So I'm sure you can see why..." She continued, letting go of Claudia's hands, "Why we have a problem with it."

Claudia didn't know why she was starting to understand, she didn't know why she wanted to. I mean, she used it for everything. It was just kind of who she was.

"I'll try and stop using it."

And she didn't know why she wanted to stop. Rayla might have been her friend, but was she even Rayla's friend?

She smiled at Claudia, and she started to think that yeah, she was Rayla's friend, "Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, who knows." Claudia replied, "Maybe I'll just, find something else to do."

"You could learn primal magic."

"I'm not really sure about that." Claudia mentioned, "I mean, it's never really been my thing, not like it was with Callum. I haven't been able to find a primal source that really... seemed like something I could learn."

"I know you can." Rayla sat down, so Claudia sat next to her, "I could tell you about the moon."

"No thanks." Claudia said, "Callum already told me so much about the moon. And the sky."

"I see." Rayla smiled, and for a few minutes they just looked at the sky.

"You can see so many stars from here." Claudia commented, softly, "It's beautiful."

"Claudia?"

"Hmm?' Claudia glanced at Rayla, smiling.

"What about the stars as your primal source?" Rayla asked, and she looked like she might be blushing.

"Oh, that's..." Claudia stood up, "That's perfect."

Rayla stood up and watched as Claudia continued.

"I mean, it's one of the only ones we didn't try." She commented, "Because there wasn't a lot about them in the book."

"Probably not. There isn't a lot known about them." Rayla mentioned, "Well, mostly, not a lot that we understand."

"Then I'll learn everything I can." Claudia hugged Rayla, "And then, maybe I won't need to use anything else. Maybe this is what Callum was talking about."

Claudia looked through the primal magic book, flipping through the pages to find something, "I'm going to learn star magic."

"It might be difficult." Rayla added, and she was looking at the map she had apparently brought with her, "But we could probably find you a book, or something... Maybe over here."

"Where's that?" Claudia asked, briefly looking away from the book and looking at the map.

"It's a place where we might be able to find a star elf." Rayla answered, and she smiled at Claudia, "As long as you wear your disguise, they'll just think you're another elf. And maybe, talking to tell would help you unlock the star arcanum."

"So basically, the one primal source I think I might be able to learn..." Claudia asked, "Is the one that would be the most difficult?"

"Pretty much." Rayla said, "But I know you can do it."

Claudia smiled, and then remembered something, "We should probably go back soon, huh?"

"Maybe." Rayla replied, and Claudia took her hand, smiling.

"Come on."


	24. learning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia learns about star magic.

"So, star magic," Callum said, as they continued walking towards where the star elf presumably was. It wasn't exactly in the pathway they were taking, but it was close, "You finally found a primal source you want to learn. That's exciting."

"Yeah." Claudia replied, "I guess it'll be nice to learn something different again. It's been a long time since I've learned any primal magic."

"It's great that you're learning primal magic." Ezran added in, "Are we going to see Elf Claudia and Elf Callum today?"

"Yep."

"They're not as a good as Human Rayla." Claudia mentioned, "But I think we're starting to get better. Callum and I practice a lot of new elf things to say."

"You met Human Rayla?" Ezran asked, "When did that happen?"

"I don't know, it was awhile ago." Claudia answered, "But she's just so accurate."

"I know. I'm a huge fan of Human Rayla."

Rayla stopped suddenly and turned around, though it looked like she might be smiling, "We're here."

They all walked around hesitantly, though confused. It didn't seem anything like the elf town that Rayla had lived in, it just seemed like nature. It was very pretty, though, it looked like a graet place to just read a book.

"So where is the star elf?" Claudia questioned, looking around. There didn't seem to be anyone around, though there were a few things flying around, probably moths.

"I'm not sure." Rayla replied, "We might not be able to find any, but maybe you can still learn something."

"We should split up." Callum suggested, "Me, Ezran and Zym can go look over there... And you, Claudia and Bait could go there."

Bait made a noise, apparently not liking something about that plan. He went over to Ezran, like he maybe wanted to be with them, which Ezran then commented on, "He wants to come with us."

"Okay, so Rayla and Claudia could take Zym." Callum replied, "And we'll take Bait."

After they all split up, they started searching, though it was a little difficult to stay focused, even if it seemed like Claudia was never even paying attention.

"Whoa." Claudia gasped, whispering, "What is that?"

Rayla walked towards her, quietly, to see what she was referring to. Which happened to be a moth, though it looked quite a bit different from the moon moth, "It's a star moth."

"Huh. I've never seen a star moth before." Claudia commented.

"That's not surprising. They're not very common." Rayla mentioned, as the star moth flew away, "Most creatures connected to the stars aren't. They tend to keep to themselves."

"Huh." Claudia smiled, though they were interrupted before she could say anything else.

"Hey, guys? I mean... Hey, guys!" Callum called them over, doing a terrible accent, "We found someone."

Rayla and Claudia ran towards them quickly, though they were kind of surprised. Ezran was standing in front of a tall, sparkly elf. Though, surprisingly, the elf looked to be around their age.

"Oh." Claudia gasped, and then with a bad accent, "Hey... Elf.. pal. How is it going?"

"Hello." The elf replied, "Are you human?"

"What? No!" Claudia lied, "Just got these four fingers. Nothing else. And... probably the same amount of toes."

"Yep." Callum added in, continuing, "Wait, what are those extra ones those humans have called, again?"

"Um... Fingers?" Claudia suggested. Rayla sighed.

"I don't care if you're human." The elf said, "I just want to know what you are doing here."

"Uh..." Claudia glanced towards Rayla.

"We are... trying to learn about primal sources." Rayla answered, "Like, uh, the stars."

"Why do you want to know about the stars?" She asked, "You're not going to understand."

"But we want to try." Claudia told her. She did want to try, she told Rayla she would, "I mean, we might as well."

"So, uh..." Callum continued talking in a bad accent, "Could you tell us about the star arcanum?"

"I suppose." The elf shrugged, "Are you going to keep doing that?"

"Callum, you don't have to keep doing you elf impression." Rayla elaborated.

"Well, we don't run into a lot of elves, and I kind of like doing it. So I would prefer to keep doing it." Callum pointed out.

The elf sighed, and turned around to walk away, "Come with me. I will attempt to explain the star arcanum."

They followed her, though they knew very little about her.

"Though it isn't often understood by those who are not connected to the star arcanum," She explained, "It's about something everyone understands, and yet, something they do not. Time, distance... People get so focused on things that don't even matter."

"Huh." And suddenly, the idea of stars seemed more appealing than the idea of star magic. Claudia wasn't entirely sure if this was still the one she wanted to learn, but she didn't want to give up.

"It's not something that everyone understands." She said, before she did some star magic to show them, "You probably won't, either."

"But we'll try." Claudia replied, "And maybe, some day..."

"Perhaps." The elf commented, "Though, you will have to figure it out for yourself. I have explained it as much as I can."

"Thank you."

* * *

"So, uh, that was strange." Claudia commented. It had been awhile since they had left, and they were currently heading towards Zym's home. They were getting pretty close.

"Yeah. Though, to be fair, Lujanne was strange too." Callum mentioned.

"Because she kept trying to get us to eat worms?" Ezran asked.

"That, and when she was explaining the moon arcanum. Mostly that, though." Callum answered casually.

"Huh. Hey, uh, by the way." Claudia questioned, "Who was that wolf girl?"

"You mean Ellis? Or her wolf?"

"Ellis was nice. We should visit her sometime, after we get Zym home." Ezran suggested, and then opened his bag a little bit, "What do you think, Zym?"

Bait attempted to add in his opinion, and Claudia looked down to notice he was grey, "Huh."

Claudia pet the glow toad in an attempt to cheer him up, though it didn't seem it work. It wasn't surprising though, as Bait usually wasn't pleased.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not entirely sure about stars for Claudia yet? I tried to take the primal source thing as her and got earth, which also seemed maybe kind of fitting? I'm just going to ask the dragon prince official.


	25. also not the best ideas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rayla, Callum, Ezran and Claudia continue their journey.

Claudia sighed, staring at the book Callum was letting her read in an attempt to learn about primal sources.

Maybe it was just because she was trying to do it quickly, since she wanted to be able to use magic again. She wasn't particularly helpful if she didn't, and she had to protect Callum and Ezran while they returned Zym. But regardless, it just didn't seem like her thing.

Rayla wanted her to learn primal magic, and so did Callum and Ezran. Her friends all wanted her to be able to do primal magic. But it was just... very different.

Primal magic was a lot different from what she was used to, especially without a primal stone. And Claudia didn't really know a lot about star magic, either, which wasn't surprising since it wasn't common here, either.

Learning magic would be helpful to their current mission, though their disguises were also great. But their elf impressions could still use some work, and Ezran didn't have one.

She didn't particularly want to stop using her magic, but talking to Rayla made it seem... different.

It wasn't like she didn't know elves could be used for magic. She had known that for a long time, but it wasn't like she was friends with any elves before. But here Rayla was, and she was her friend.

"Okay, book." Claudia said, sitting up. She opened it and looked through it for something about star magic, "Let's see what you have about star magic."

* * *

"Viren, you can't do this." Someone argued hesitantly. Corvus and Gren weren't quite sure who in particular, due to how many people there were.

It was surprising that, even with how much stronger he seemed to have gotten, he hadn't attempted to chain them up, although he was quite busy lately.

But he was acting weird lately, like perhaps he was taking a different approach than chaining them up. That wouldn't work very well now, though. Whatever he had in mind, it didn't seem particularly great.

"And why exactly is that?" He questioned, turning away from the mirror briefly and staring at them.

"Ezran returned, and he told us that Callum was okay, too." Another person argued, "But then you attacked him, after you broke out-"

"He is a child. We need someone who can make tough decisions." He interrupted, "If we don't work together and fight, then the elves and dragons are going to do it for us."

"You have no proof that they will." Corvus said, "I saw the dragon that Soren fought, but it wasn't even attacking until he started the fight."

Viren sighed, "I'm not sure you understand. Even with how many times I've explained it, none of you seem to get it!"

He pulled something off of the mirror, "Let's try a different approach."

* * *

It was starting to seem like Claudia had already read pretty much everything about star magic, and there really wasn't anything about unlocking the star arcanum. Though, she did learn some cool star magic.

Callum had told her about how he unlocked the sky arcanum a lot of times, though he mentioned that it really wasn't easy. Sometimes, though, it just seemed like she wouldn't be able to.

Rayla approached her, like she often did, "Claudia?"

She looked up from the book, and then closed it. Claudia stood up, noticing that Callum, Ezran, Zym and Bait were a little bit behind Rayla. They all looked ready to leave.

"We're getting really close. We could probably even get there there within a day or two, if we really try." Rayla smiled, glancing at the map Callum was holding.

"Yep," Callum replied, and then pointed towards something on the map, "Actually, it looks like if we take this path we'll get there a little bit faster."

"Is it anything like the last path?" Ezran asked, picking up the baby dragon, "Because that one was kinda..."

"It doesn't look like it is." Callum argued, "And besides, that last one did get us there slightly faster, right?"

"Maybe a little." Rayla said, "Although, that one does look safer. Or, at least it would be if you  _all_  had elf disguises, since there's  _maybe_  just a few elves."

"Would they be able to tell Ezran is human if he wore this?" Callum asked, holding up what he previously used as a disguise.

"There's a lot of them, Callum." Rayla argued, "Maybe a few of them wouldn't notice, but there's a whole bunch of them there."

"Right. No slightly faster path."

Rayla turned around, "So, we should probably go."

* * *

He sighed, leaning against a tree. They were probably further than where they should have been, even if it wasn't that far.

"He's too strong for us to be able to do anything." Corvus told him, "We have to tell Amaya."

Gren nodded, though a little distracted by what he was holding in his hand.

"And I'm sure we can find a way to help him." Corvus mentioned, looking at what was in Gren's hands.

"That would be great." Gren looked at the coin, and sighed, "Though, I'm not quite sure if it's possible."

* * *

Zym ran around, excited. Though, at some points he was starting to fly around.

"We're almost there." Ezran said, smiling at Zym. Zym ran up to him and jumped in his arms, and then quickly went over to Callum as well.

Rayla sat down, leaning against a tree. Claudia was sitting next to her, watching as the baby dragon ran around.

"Just a few days and he'll be home." Rayla mentioned, smiling at the baby dragon who then ran up to Claudia. She pet him.

Rayla stood up and walked towards some bushes, looking behind them, "There's other elves here... But it looks like..."

"Like what?" Callum asked, standing up and walking closer towards Ezran.

"I'm not sure." Rayla mentioned, "We need to go."

"We should split up." Callum suggested, "You and Claudia can take Ezran, Zym and Bait. I'll distract them."

"It's too dangerous." Rayla argued.

"That is pretty dangerous." Claudia added in, "Why don't you just come with us?"

"I have a disguise, which is pretty realistic. And I also have magic, including that one that makes the ice. It'll give you guys a better chance to get away if they attack."

"We don't even know if they will."

"Yeah, but if they do then we'll be ready to fight them." Callum argued, "You guys should go, I'll catch up later."

"Are you sure about this?" Rayla asked.

"Well... Sort of."


	26. decisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia makes some decisions.

Claudia glanced at Ezran and Rayla, as they sat down briefly. Ezran checked on Zym and Bait, while Rayla seemed to be thinking about if Callum was okay.

"He'll probably catch up soon." Rayla said, and walked towards Claudia to sit down near her and Ezran, "But we probably shouldn't go too much further."

Claudia nodded, and then looked down at the book again. She considered opening it, but they were interrupted before they had the chance. Rayla quickly stood up and pulled out her swords, and Claudia grabbed Ezran.

It looked like some sort of star moth or something, though it was kind of unusual to see one around. Rayla would have put her swords away, but then there was Viren, sort of.

"Dad?" Claudia quietly asked, looking at what seemed to be an illusion of her dad.

"Claudia." Viren replied, "I see you found the princes. Which is great, but I think I can handle it now. Where's the other one? And the egg?"

Ezran held onto the bag Zym was in, making sure he stayed inside of it.

Viren glanced at Rayla, "I'm surprised you haven't managed to do something about the elf yet."

"Well..." Claudia wasn't sure exactly what to say, especially after everything Ezran told her.

"What are you doing here?" Rayla questioned, walking towards him.

Viren ignored her, "I'll help you with the elf now. I assume you've recently caught up to them, which isn't surprising. You are human."

"I don't really need any help with the elf." Claudia mentioned, "I've got it covered."

"This is a moonshadow elf assassin, Claudia." Viren argued, "It might have been fine when you had Soren with you as well, but after that dragon attack-"

"Right. How is he?" Claudia interrupted, and kind of looked at Rayla like maybe she should take Ezran and leave. She seemed to get it, as she slowly started moving towards Ezran. She grabbed Bait and then took Ezran's hand.

"He's fine, but-" Viren didn't finish his sentence, glancing towards Rayla and Ezran as they ran away, "They're getting away!"

"Oh, darn!" Claudia shrugged, "I guess there's nothing we can do."

Apparently, Viren could still do magic, even if he was an illusion. He started off with something quickly and attacked them. Rayla managed to dodge with Ezran, though with difficulty.

"Dad, wait-"

Viren attacked again, and Rayla managed to get Ezran out of the way, though she did get hit a little bit by his magic, "Ezran, go!"

"I'm not leaving you here."

"Just go." Rayla told him, "You have to get Zym to safety."

He nodded, and relunctantly left. Viren sighed, "I suppose at least we have the elf."

"You really don't need to attack them-" Claudia attempted to tell him, though he didn't seem to be listening.

Rayla ran towards Viren with her swords, even though he was an illusion and it really didn't do anything. Viren attacked her again, though she just barely managed to dodge it.

"Dad!" Claudia shouted to get his attention, and he turned towards her.

"Claudia, I don't know why you keep insisting that I can't help out." Viren said, "This is a moonshadow elf, and it seems she's too strong for you to fight alone."

"She's my friend." Claudia replied, since not explaining her recent friendship with a moonshadow elf wasn't going particularly well.

"Your friend?" He asked, "Claudia, she's an elf. One of the elves that attacked us, one of the elves that kidnapped the princes!"

"Well, she didn't kidnap them." Claudia attempted to explain, "She's just helping them with a mission."

"A mission?" Viren questioned, "Returning that egg? That egg will be the most powerful creature in world, and the elves and dragons will use it against us."

"Or, maybe it'll actually change things." Claudia suggested, "I mean, it could be a chance for peace."

Viren sighed, "Claudia, I don't think you understand. We can talk about this some other time, but currently..."

He turned back towards Rayla, who hadn't left for some reason.

"Do you really think returning that dragon will be enough? After everythiny that's happened?"

"It could change things." Rayla argued, "Returning the dragon prince is our only chance for peace."

Viren sighed, "Claudia, there's too much history-"

"That's not important." She said, "I mean, maybe we're just... Maybe those are just kinda... In the past."

He sighed, again, and then attacked Rayla who wasn't able to dodge entirely. It hit a little bit of her, knocking her back.

"Rayla!" Claudia shouted, running towards her to see if she was okay. Claudia turned towards her dad, and sighed. He seemed to be attempting to attack Rayla again, though she wasn't sure if Rayla would be able to dodge quick enough.

Callum still hadn't caught up with them yet, and unfortunately there wasn't really a lot she could do.

Claudia stopped his attack with magic, though it wasn't primal magic. But she had to protect her friends. It gave her enough time to grab Rayla and run, however.

* * *

She placed Rayla near Ezran after she caught up to him. Rayla didn't seem particularly pleased, though she didn't say anything immediately.

"You shouldn't have used that." Rayla eventually told her.

"Yeah." Claudia agreed, "But there wasn't any other option, I mean, it didn't look like you'd be able to dodge or anything."

"That doesn't matter." Rayla replied, and sighed, "Let's just wait here so Callum can catch up."

Claudia sighed, as well. She sat near Rayla, while Ezran let Zym out of the bag.

"I don't get it." Claudia mentioned, thinking about what had previously happened, "Dad was acting so weird... I mean, I've never seen him do anything like this before. That illusion..."

"Yeah." Ezran agreed, "He's been really weird lately, and stronger..."

"Well, whatever it is," Rayla added in, "We just have to avoid him for now. We're really close to returning Zym."

"Yep." Callum walked up to them, "You guys went pretty far."

"We kind of had to." Rayla pointed out, "Claudia's dad showed up, but like an illusion or something. I couldn't use my swords."

"You ran into Viren?" Callum asked, sitting down near Ezran.

"Yep. He attacked us again." Ezran explained, "Mostly just Rayla, though."

"Did you run into any elves?" Rayla asked.

"No, not really." Callum replied, "They didn't really seem like they wanted to fight us, anyway."

Claudia sighed, and leaned back. She felt kind of... weird. It was probably because she hadn't used magic in awhile. Until she eventually, sort of just fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know, we've only seen callum unlock the sky arcanum after that dream he had so... claudia's getting one of those dreams.
> 
> probably a little bit sooner than expected.


	27. different strategies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Callum, Rayla and Ezran protect Claudia.

Claudia wasn't entirely sure what was going on... She walked around pointlessly, curious about her surroundings. It was strange.

"Claudia." Viren said, so Claudia turned towards him.

"Dad?" Claudia questioned, confused, "What are you doing here?"

He looked down at the book in her hands, "Primal magic? Claudia, you know you can't do primal magic without a primal stone."

"I know." Claudia agreed, "But, it's a great book to read."

Viren sighed, "You're trying to learn primal magic. Like Callum, right?"

"That would be pretty cool."

"But you already have magic, Claudia." Viren told her, "You never had a problem using it before. I can't see why anything would be different."

"Well, I guess... Maybe I should've looked into other kinds of magic."

"Humans can't do primal magic." Viren pointed out, "Unless you get another primal stone, you really can't do anything with that book, Claudia."

Claudia looked down at the book.

* * *

"Claudia?" Ezran asked, attempting to wake Claudia up. He looked at Bait, "Maybe you can lick her and she'll wake up?"

Bait made noises, and Zym walked up and tried to wake her up as well, though she didn't seem to be waking up anytime soon.

"Guys?" Ezran turned towards Rayla and Callum, "I think there might be something wrong with Claudia."

* * *

"I know it's frustrating." Viren walked closer to Claudia, "But we can still do magic without a primal source. We can do incredible things, Claudia."

"I know." Claudia looked up from the book, "But we can't do those things, and I mean..."

Claudia grabbed the white strands of hair, holding them, "Maybe Callum and Ezran were right. I mean, I'm glad I could heal Soren. But maybe... they had a point about it."

"It's natural to have doubts." Viren said, "I've had some as well, but the point is that you don't have a primal source."

"But maybe I could. Callum unlocked the sky arcanum, so couldn't I just do that? Or, at least try."

"You won't be able to." Viren replied.

"But I can still try."

* * *

Rayla sighed, standing near Callum and Ezran while they checked on Claudia.

"Maybe she's just tired." Ezran suggested.

"Maybe." Callum agreed.

"Whatever it is, we have to be careful with her asleep. If someone attacks us, she won't be able to do anything." Rayla pointed out, and she sat next to where Claudia was sleeping.

Rayla watched Claudia, a little bit concerned.

* * *

"Yeah, do that." Soren suggested, going over towards Claudia.

"Soren?" Claudia questioned, glancing at him, "I thought you didn't like magic."

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean you should give up." Soren said, "If I gave up on swordfighting, I wouldn't exactly be swordfighting people. Just like how I'm not giving up on poetry."

"And what if you can't?" Viren interrupted, "You've been doing magic for a long time, Claudia."

"Well, she can keep trying." Soren replied, "She'll get it eventually."

"That could take months, maybe even years."

"So?" Soren asked, "Didn't it take her a similar amount of time to learn magic in the first place? She didn't give up on that. Although, she did give up on handstands."

Viren sighed, and turned back towards Claudia.

"Soren does have a point. I should at least try." Claudia told him, "So, I'm going to try."

* * *

"Is something wrong with Claudia?" Viren asked. Callum and Ezran stood up immediately after noticing him, and Rayla quickly did as well. Ezran grabbed Zym, and Callum got ready to attack.

"You can't assume I'm here to attack. I'm just curious." Viren said, and then looked at the elf suspiciously.

"I think she's fine." Callum replied.

"You think?" Viren questioned, and sighed, "I suppose I'm just going to have to deal with the elf myself."

"You're not dealing with anyone." Callum told him.

* * *

Viren and Soren disappeared, and her surroundings changed.

It was like the cliff she and Rayla fought that dragon at, though she didn't actually see Rayla there. The dragon flew around though, and she wasn't sure what to do.

The dragon flew towards Claudia, in an attempt to attack. But she couldn't really do anything to fight it, so she ran in the other direction. The cliff was destroyed, and without Rayla she couldn't really jump across.

She didn't really have time to come up with a plan, though, so she jumped across.

* * *

"Rayla, can you take Ezran?" Callum asked, "I can stay here with Claudia."

"Callum, you should go with Ezran." Rayla argued, "You two should take Zym and go."

"Rayla, we're not leaving you and Claudia here." Callum told her, "I'll stay and protect Claudia. She's my friend-"

"She's my friend too." Rayla interrupted, "And so are you and Ezran. And you have to get Zym home. We'll catch up."

"No." Ezran said, "We're in this together. We should all stay with Claudia."

Rayla walked towards Viren, "You know what? We should."

* * *

Claudia just barely grabbed onto a rock, though it was a lot more difficult than she originally thought.

She wasn't sure what to do, since there was really only the one rock. Claudia looked down, noticing the water. If she just had the right things, she could use it to her advantage...

But since Claudia didn't have anything she needed, she had to find a different solution. Hesitantly, she moved to a different rock.

* * *

Viren attacked Rayla, but she dodged it. There wasn't enough room for Callum to use the ice spell, and he didn't think he should use the lightning one, so there weren't a lot of options for him.

He kept attacking her, so she kept dodging. Though eventually, she ended up close to Claudia.

* * *

Although it took awhile, Claudia managed to get across. She climbed up and sat down briefly, though standing up since there was still a dragon that was going to attack her.

The dragon went to attack her again, so she ran.


	28. the star arcanum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia continues her attempt to unlock the star arcanum.

Claudia's surroundings changed again, and she saw her dad attacking her friends. She wasn't sure what to do, since she couldn't really fight him.

She looked around, trying to think of something. And then her dad attacked her.

* * *

Rayla picked up Claudia carefully, and turned towards Callum, "We have to take Claudia and go. We can't fight him."

"Okay." Callum agreed, "You and Ezran can take Claudia first, I'll use my ice spell to slow him down once you're out."

Viren attacked Rayla again, though she didn't have any time to dodge and she got hit.

* * *

Claudia was starting to panic. She wasn't sure what was happening, or why her dad was being so weird.

"Hey, Claudia." Soren said. Claudia glanced at him, concerned.

"Soren? What's wrong with dad?" Claudia asked him.

"I'm not sure. But we can figure it out." Soren replied, "We usually do. You come up with solutions all the time."

"Yeah, I guess..." Claudia still wasn't sure, "But this is... different. Dad's been acting weird for awhile and I'm not sure what to do about it. Or maybe... I'm weird. I mean, I am friends with an elf. And I never thought that I would be."

"You are weird, Claudia."

"And when we went to get the princes, I never thought I'd be trying to learn primal magic instead of just using what I've used for so long. We thought that Rayla had kidnapped the princes and we were going to..."

"To fight her." Soren said, "But now, I guess you're friends with her. So that makes that a little weird. But, to be fair... The princes don't seem to find it weird that the elf was originally their enemy who was going to fight them, so I guess it's just kind of normal now."

"Yeah." Claudia smiled, "I guess it kind of is."

* * *

Rayla almost dropped Claudia, and Callum turned towards Viren. He wasn't particularly pleased.

"Viren, why are you even attacking us?" Callum asked, getting ready to use his ice spell, "You know Rayla's our friend. Why have you been acting so weird?"

"You wouldn't understand." Viren said, "But your friend is an elf. She's our enemy!"

Callum sighed, and used his ice spell. Viren quickly destroyed it, though they were able to get away while he was attempting to get past it.

They set Claudia down once they were far enough away. Callum and Ezran looked at Rayla, since she was recently attacked by Viren's attack.

"Rayla, are you okay?" Callum asked, "It looked like you might have got hit pretty bad-"

"I'm okay." Rayla interrupted, "It's not that bad."

"Are you sure?" Ezran questioned, "It looked pretty strong."

Rayla sat down, looking at Claudia to see if she was okay. She sighed.

* * *

Claudia sighed, lying down, "You know, Soren. I'm not sure if I can learn primal magic."

"What makes you say that?"

"Callum explained to me the sky arcanum, how it wasn't just one thing. It was all the things. And I've kept thinking about that, and what that one star elf said."

"And even what Callum told me that Lujanne said about the moon arcanum. And everything I've read in this primal magic book." She looked at the book, "But I still haven't been able to figure out the star arcanum."

"Well, maybe you should just think about the stars." Soren suggested, "You know, what they remind you of. The moon arcanum and the sky arcanum are going to be different, anyway."

"Yeah, maybe." Claudia smiled.

"So, what do the stars make you think of?" Soren asked.

Claudia thought about it, "Well... I guess they're sort of... bigger than us? They're out of our reach, like a lot of things, you know? They're pretty unique from the other primal sources..."

"You know, in a way they kind of seem the opposite of your magic." Soren suggested.

"Huh." She took that into consideration. In a way, they sort of were. It was a little more than just being a primal source. The star elf said that it was about things people both did and didn't understand, and in that was she supposed they were similar.

Claudia never really thought that people understood her kind of magic, but maybe she was the one that didn't. But she had her own view on it, and that view eventually changed.

She thought about her relationship with Rayla for a moment, how at first she and Soren had attacked her.

Claudia and Rayla had maybe gotten a little bit closer to being friends there. At least a little bit. And then when she and Soren betrayed them, there was a lot of distance between them since Rayla didn't trust her.

And eventually, at some point, Rayla did trust her. Claudia wasn't sure when exactly, it was hard to tell. But she did. And they sort of became friends... And then, with the dragon situation, they did become friends.

She remembered when she and Rayla were on that cliff, fighting that dragon. It almost seemed like it had been longer than it was, with how dangerous that was.

Claudia didn't say anything for awhile, until eventually, "Some things... seem smaller than other things. I guess maybe things always seem smaller to me than they should."

"Maybe that's why you almost walk into trees so much?"

"Yeah, maybe." Claudia smiled, "Maybe I've been too focused on learning this immediately. It'd be a lot more helpful if I did. But, I mean... We've already almost returned Zym, anyway. Maybe I should take my time."

"Maybe." Soren agreed, "These things do tend to take time. Like handstands."

"Yeah." Claudia replied, "I guess."

She smiled, and her surroundings started to change.

* * *

She woke up, though she was a little confused at her surroundings. They were... different. Rayla was beside her again, lying next to her.

Claudia sat up, confused. It seemed to be late at night, since Callum and Ezran seemed to be asleep.

"Claudia?" Rayla sat up a little bit as well, "You're awake."

"Yeah." Claudia said quietly, "And I think I understand the star arcanum."

"Really?" Rayla asked, and then made a noise in pain.

"Are you okay?" Claudia questioned, looking at her friend. Rayla nodded, though she started lying down again, so Claudia did the same.

"Your dad showed up again." Rayla told her.

"Did he attack any of you?" Claudia asked, though she kind of assumed he did.

"Well, sort of. He was trying to." She replied, "He did manage to hit me one time when we were trying to get away."

Claudia had a lot of feelings about that, and she wasn't sure which ones to focus on. She was worried about Rayla, who her dad had recently attacked. And her dad was acting so weird lately...

Like attacking her friends, or the conversation she and Soren had. It was just weird, and she wasn't really sure what to say to Rayla about it.

"Sorry about that."

Rayla looked a little bit confused at that. She moved closer towards Claudia, and she blushed, "You know, we were kinda worried about you."

"Hmm?"

"You were just kind of sleeping, but Ezran tried to wake you up." Rayla explained, "But we thought you might just be tired or something."

Claudia smiled, though she didn't reply. So Rayla added, "So, uh, the star arcanum?"

"Yeah." Claudia said, "I mean, I'm not sure about it. I don't actually know any star magic yet, but I feel like... Maybe I understand it now. It's kind of like that star elf said, you know? It just makes more sense to me now. A lot of things make more sense to me now."

"I'm kind of... glad I decided to start learning primal magic." Claudia smiled at Rayla, and she appeared to be blushing, "I mean, I didn't think I would... Even if I didn't actually unlock the star arcanum, I still tried."

"And you really, kind of encouraged me to do it. I guess you helped me with a different perspective. I don't think I've ever really thought about it like that..." Claudia continued, "I guess I just wasn't friends with an elf before."

Rayla took Claudia's hand, smiling back at her. They really had become a lot closer, and it was starting to seem like it was a lot longer than it was that they had been enemies. It was weird to think there was a point where they were.

"I'm glad we're friends, Claudia." Her voice was soft, and she held onto Claudia's hand, "I'm sorry I took so long to trust you. I should've given you a chance sooner."

"Well, I did kind of betray you." Claudia mentioned, "So, I mean... You were kind of right not to. I probably wouldn't have."

Rayla smiled at her, and she and Claudia sat up. Rayla let go of her hand briefly, and was quick to hug Claudia. When they stopped hugging, Rayla looked into her eyes for a moment before they eventually returned to lying down.

"You know, it is pretty late." Claudia pointed out, and Rayla moved closer towards her.

"It is." Rayla agreed, "You should try and get some more sleep, or you might be tired when we head out."

Claudia nodded, though she really wasn't particularly tired. She didn't think she'd be able to fall asleep for awhile, but Rayla quickly fell asleep next to her.

She smiled, thinking about the distance she and Rayla originally had. In the moment, they were close in multiple ways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so uh... We really don't know a lot about primal sources, especially the stars. So I'm not sure if this really seems accurate or anything. Probably not.
> 
> And since we don't know a lot about the stars, anyone have an idea for some kind of spell for Claudia to do with her primal source? Because I really can't seem to think of any right now.


	29. struggles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claudia struggles with magic while they attempt to figure out where they are.

Claudia flipped through the pages of the book, skimming them as she searched for something easy for her to learn.

She hadn't been particularly tired, so she didn't get that much more sleep. She seemed to be the only one awake, anyway, so she figured she should look for a spell to try out to see if it worked.

There weren't that many star magic spells in the book, since there weren't that many who knew much about it. But there were a few, such as ones to create a small light source and a navigation spell that sounded a lot like the one she originally used to track them.

The one to create a light source seemed easy enough, especially to practice with because she didn't have anything to track. So Claudia stood up and put the book up against something, so she could look at it as she attempted.

She attempted it a few times, though it wasn't easy and she didn't really have any success, though she was getting closer.

Rayla woke up early, too, like she often did. Claudia smiled at her, though neither of them said anything. Callum and Ezran woke up a little while after, too.

"Claudia?" Callum asked, "When did you wake up?"

Claudia shrugged, since she wasn't really sure, and added, "I think I unlocked the star arcanum."

"Wait... Really?" Callum questioned, and then excitedly added, "That's great! Now you can start learning primal magic! What's the star arcanum like?"

Claudia sighed, "It's too early for this. I think I'm going to have to find another way to make hot brown morning potion without the use of magic..."

Since she had been awake for awhile, she was starting to get a little bit tired despite how much sleep she had gotten. It was frustrating.

"What's hot brown morning potion?" Ezran asked, out of curiosity.

Claudia sighed, leaning against a tree. She didn't feel up to explaining it at the moment, especially with how much she wanted to be drinking some right now. Rayla stood up too, and walked over towards them.

"Anyway," Rayla suggested, "We shouldn't be here for that long. Claudia's dad might come back again and we need to return the dragon prince as soon as we can."

"Yeah." Callum agreed, "We don't really have any way of fighting him, and he really doesn't like Rayla and Zym. Oh, and uh, Claudia, your dad showed up again."

"I know." Claudia said, though her voice was quiet since she was starting to get tired.

"But Rayla, you should probably get some rest. After Viren hit you with that magic..." Callum mentioned.

"I'm fine." Rayla told him, and glanced towards Claudia, "We're still close to returning Zym home, even if we're a little lost."

"Are we a little lost?" Ezran asked, "I mean, I wasn't keeping track of where we were running when we were getting away from Viren, but I think we're at least pretty lost."

"We'll figure it out." Rayla replied, as she walked towards Callum and took the map. She glanced at the trees, "I'll go see if I can figure out where we are. You guys stay here and keep an eye on Zym."

"Is that really a good idea?" Ezran questioned, "I mean, it seems like we've spent more time away from each other than with each other, and we keep getting separated."

"Ez has a point." Callum said, "We can't keep splitting up. It's only going to take longer to take Zym home if we do."

"But, I think most of the time we kinda had to." Claudia added in, "I mean, with with the elves and the dragons, and then my dad..."

"Claudia's right." Rayla replied, "We don't have much of a choice. But maybe, we should try to stay together this time, but I won't be long."

"Are you sure about this?" Callum asked, "I mean, going on your own?"

"Fine, then. Ez can come." She suggested, gesturing to Ezran, "But you should stay with Claudia."

"Okay." Callum hesitantly agreed, "At least Ezran will be with you."

* * *

"So... Rayla." Ezran smiled, starting a conversation after awhile of walking, "Any idea where we are?"

"Maybe." Rayla answered, looking at the map, "But I'm not sure. I was too distracted when we were fighting. I'm not sure I can figure it out."

"I'm sure you can." Ezran said, cheerfully, and pointed to something on the map, "If you want, I could ask an animal if they know where to find that."

"Do you think that would work?" Rayla asked.

"Maybe." Ezran replied, "If they know where we are."

* * *

Later, after they stopped for the night maybe a little bit closer to returning Zym home, Claudia went to practice primal magic again.

It was nice to be able to do magic again, and she honestly just wanted to attempt to learn every star magic spell she could, but she decided to focus on the one from earlier. Rayla came to watch, as Claudia attempted to create a light source.

She attempted it a few times, but it wasn't going particularly great so she decided to take a short break, "It's kinda funny, isn't it?"

"What is?" Rayla asked, approaching Claudia.

"Your primal source is the moon, and I just unlocked the star arcanum so, mine is kind of the stars." Claudia elaborated, glancing at Rayla briefly, smiling before she turned back and looked at the sky, "So we're kind of like the night sky."

"We kind of are." Rayla agreed, smiling back at her, "I'm glad you decided to do primal magic."

"You know, I kind of am too." Claudia said, "It's a little different, and I'll probably have to learn some different ways of doing things, like making pancakes or hot brown morning potion. But I did kinda rely on it too much."

"Yeah," Rayla smiled, before suggesting, "Maybe while you're here I could tell you about some recipes?"

She blushed when Claudia turned around, because she looked really, just... pretty, with how her hair flowed behind her as she did.

"Really?" Claudia asked, excited.

Rayla nodded, "Maybe you'll be able to find a way to make that 'hot brown morning potion' with something from Xadia?"

Claudia hugged Rayla, cheerfully, "Maybe you could tell me some things. Like, uh, what do elves eat? Soren told me you guys don't really drink..."

"We don't." Rayla replied.

"So, what do you guys eat?" Claudia questioned, "I mean, aside from the stuff that your friend gave us."

"Well..."


End file.
